On Hartwell’s monitor, a trio of bright stars winked on. “Uh-oh,” he said. “We are taking fire. But it’s not the big gun.”
“What do you have?”
“Lasers. Megajoule range. Probably slaws.”
“The big gun must not be up there,” she said. “Open fire!”
Megajoule laser fire wouldn’t penetrate the LAV’s armor, at least, not right away, though there would be some armor loss with repeated hits, and a lucky shot might puncture a tire or fry delicate electronic optics.
“All units, keep firing!” Fuentes ordered. “I want that installation fried!”
All three LAVs joined in the long-range bombardment, along with those Marines outside armed with squad lasers. There was little indication that a battle was being fought, though once a boulder to the left of LAV-2 suddenly blossomed with an intolerably bright patch and a puff of vaporized rock. Several Marines crouched in the dust nearby rose and started moving back down the reverse slope, seeking better cover.
It was a one-sided battle, however, and in another few moments, the laser positions atop the distant mountain were no longer firing. Hartwell reported that the tower structure was no longer showing above the mountaintop, and that all radar and laser emissions from the central peak had ceased.
“Okay, Marines,” the captain’s voice sounded over the combat channel. “Good work! Donaldson! Are your people ready?”
“Set to go, Captain!” Gunnery Sergeant Donaldson’s baritone replied.
“Okay! Light the candle!”
In a display monitor on Hartwell’s console, Kaitlin could see three space-suited Marines crouched in the dust on the crater rim, fifty meters to the south. They’d set up something that looked like a complicated vidcorder on a slender tripod, lens hanging down between the legs. There was a puff of dust as the device’s solid-fuel motor fired, and the device rocketed swiftly and silently into the black Lunar sky, leaving the tripod behind.
“Let me know when you have signal acquisition,” she said.
Hartwell nodded inside his helmet. “Will do, Lieutenant. It’s climbing…still in the clear. Eight kilometers. Ten…Fourteen…”
The small probe was serving a double purpose. As it gained altitude, curving back toward the west, it would soon clear the horizon with the Doolittle, a US Aerospace Force ship near L-5, a spot still well below the horizon from Tsiolkovsky; it was the Doolittle that had picked up word fourteen hours earlier that the RAG was safely down and had relayed the information to L-3.
As soon as the communications-relay probe rose above the horizon, it would be able to relay a second message to the Doolittle and on to the Ranger.
The second purpose, of course, was a bit more direct. If there were any remaining radar or laser sites on or near Tsiolkovsky’s central peak—or if that killer antimatter cannon of theirs was unlimbered and ready just below the LAVs’ horizon, the probe might well reveal the fact by becoming a sudden target. Its destruction might help the Marines pinpoint the AM cannon.
“I have contact with the Doolittle,” Hartwell said.
“Punch it.”
Hartwell pressed a key, transmitting a complete record of the RAG mission to date. The other LAVs also transmitted their logs.
It would help in the planning of the next assault, if this one came to grief.
There was no blaze of antimatter fire from the crater’s center, and Kaitlin let herself relax…but only a bit. The critical portion of the RAG assault had just been deferred to later.
“Okay, everybody!” Fuentes said. “Saddle up! Get ready to roll! All drivers, check your fuel. This is the last chance you’ll have to refuel!”
“Now for the hard part,” Kaitlin said to Hartwell. “Never thought I’d get to take part in a cavalry charge…across a hundred kilometers of open plain!”
PFC Jack Ramsey
USS Ranger
2245 hours GMT
“Double-check those straps!” Captain Lee shouted, pulling himself along the aisle, from seat back to seat back. “We’re boosting at six Gs…I repeat, six Gs, and if you get bounced out of your seats, it’s going to ruin your whole day!”
“Hey, Captain!” someone called out. “What’s the skinny?”
“We’ve got the word,” Lee replied, but addressing the entire compartment. “The Doolittle just relayed the go-ahead from the RAG. We’re going in hot.”
Jack felt a cold shiver at that. “Going in hot” meant a hot LZ. Specifically, it meant the surface attack group hadn’t yet neutralized the AM cannon. While that eventuality was supposed to have been anticipated by the mission planners, it was damned scary to think about flying into the mouth of a weapon that shot antimatter at you. For weeks, now, scuttlebutt throughout 1-SAG had been revolving tightly around the supposed UN superweapon, giving it planet-buster status. If the Marines already on the ground at Tsiolkovsky couldn’t nail it in the next two hours, the USS Ranger was going to be flying into some serious shit.