The Clone Republic by Steven L. Kent

Author:Steven L. Kent [Kent, Steven L.]
Format: epub, pdf
Tags: Science fiction, General, Fiction, Fiction - Science Fiction, Science Fiction - General, Adventure, Science fiction; American, Life on other planets, Soldiers, Cloning, Human cloning, Clones
ISBN: 9780441013937
Publisher: Ace
Published: 2006-03-27T23:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

The pleated cliffs surrounding the far edge of the valley had nearly vertical walls made of a black, obsidian-like rock that reflected light. From our gathering point a few hundred yards back, we did not have a good view of the dozens of caves in the craggy walls. They might have been formed by erosion, or bubbling heat, or carved by the same Mogat hands that dug the snake shafts. At the moment, our invasion looked more like a rescue operation. Teams of corpsmen brought breathing gear to men trapped in LG tanks, and evacuation teams pulled the crews to safety. From what McKay told Shannon, our engineers had not yet figured out how to pull the surviving tanks off the battlefield. At a hundred tons each, the tanks weighed too much for personnel carriers to lift, and the ground was too broken to land barges. Vince Lee made a joke about building dozens of bridges and rolling the tanks to safety, but that seemed like the most plausible answer.

While engineers and evacuation crews cleaned up after the first stage of our invasion, wings of ATs flew in another regiment to replace the dead and wounded. Captain McKay had his two platoons regroup along one side of the Mogats’ launchpad. We had lost twenty-one men—just less than half of our men, and our platoon had one of the lower casualty rates because we were at the front of the attack. We had almost been across the field by the time the shafts caved in.

We were not the only ones who had suffered. The broken hulls of so many Mogat cargo ships littered the near side of the canyon that I did not bother counting them. Our fighters and gunships had left a smoldering graveyard in their wake. The wrecked ships, strewn like broken eggshells across the ground, glowed with small fires that burned inside their hulls. The flickering flames were only visible through port-holes and cracked hatches.

The Mogats had cargo ships of various sizes in their fleet. Clearly the enemy wanted to escape, not fight. I saw no sign of the dreadnoughts that had destroyed the Chayio , just lightly armed cargo ships and transports.

“I am sending coordinates over your visor,” Captain McKay said, over an open frequency on the interLink. “We’ve been ordered to secure a cave.”

McKay’s mobile command center had survived the trap. His pilot had managed to swerve around three shafts and drive the vehicle to safety. With the airspace over the battlefield secured, the officers overseeing the invasion now commanded us from one of Klyber’s diplomatic cruisers.

“Maybe they could command us from a penthouse in Washington, DC,” Lee joked. “There aren’t many snake shafts around Capitol Hill.”

“Watch your mouth,” Shannon said, his voice snapping like a whip. “Now roll out.” Shannon, always duty-bound, did not let his men criticize officers.

The shortest way to our sector was straight across the launch area. We followed a path through the destroyed ships with our particle-beam rifles raised and ready, prepared to fire at anything that moved.

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