Semper Mars(110)

Walsh floated in and anchored himself nearby. “Think they’ll add a verse to the Marine Corps Hymn?” he asked, squeezing off a short burst.

“Hell, they’d better,” Fuentes replied, adding her fire to his. “I don’t like the unsung hero bit.”

“Me neither.” He fired again. “Everyone who can make it is on the way. If we can hold ’em—”

But there were blue helmets everywhere she looked, and they were closing in. There were only three or four Marines on this end of the ISS, counting the two of them, and they were badly outnumbered.

Which, of course, would have been the UN commander’s plan. Storm out all at once, overwhelm the few Marines you find around your exit point, then disperse and gun down the rest as they approach. A simple, almost elegant solution to what must have seemed like an insoluble tactical problem.

But Fuentes was determined to screw up their plan somehow.

With the strut as an anchoring point, she could be a lot freer with her gunfire, while the approaching blue-tops had to be careful with their bursts lest they set themselves spinning or tumbling out of control. Several of them were already out of the fight, at least for the moment, because of an incautious burst from their rifles. Fuentes ignored them, concentrating on the armored figures who seemed to be handling themselves well in microgravity. One emerged from beyond the end of Alfa carrying what could only have been a bulky, backpack-powered laser rifle; she drew careful aim on that one before he could bring the weapon into play, sending a long, savage burst ripping through his torso armor and helmet and nearly tearing him in half.

Then the rest of the Marines were arriving, drifting in on high-pressure nitrogen jets as fast as tiny fighter planes, giving no thought to slowing, to hiding, to anything except breaking that enemy formation. Two more UN blue-helmets tumbled out of the battle like string-cut puppets…followed by a third. Several more were taking cover amid the struts and crossbeams of the ISS keel, trying to anchor themselves to return fire on the advancing Marines, but enough of them had been hit or panicked that their fire was scattered and inaccurate.

When she turned, Fuentes saw the McCutcheon bearing down on them, a huge black-and-white, flattened dart casting a black shadow across half of the ISS as it edged forward, spilling additional Marines from its airlock as it came. Fitzgerald had recognized the danger, and the Marines on board were suiting up as fast as they could, entering the battle as Fitzgerald brought them closer despite the wild gunfire from the UN defenders.

Gunny Walsh turned to face Fuentes. She could see his grin through his dark helmet visor. “Well, Lieutenant,” he said. “I think we—”

His helmet visor starred, a white, frosted slash appearing across the dark plastic like a shocking splash of paint; a UN round had passed between them, just grazing his visor. Somehow, miraculously, the thin, tinted plastic didn’t crack…yet. But tiny flakes were spilling from the frosted surface, and she could see Walsh’s eyes wide with shock and fear beyond.

“My helmet!” he screamed in her headset. “Christ, my helmet! It’s going to—”

“Quiet, Marine!” she shouted back. “Don’t panic! Don’t move!” Almost without thinking, she grabbed him by the arm, pivoting them both in space until he was in front of her, then triggering her MMU jets and setting them both in motion. A round hit her suit—she felt a violent blow above her left hip that kicked her to one side, but she still had air and she ignored it, steering the two of them toward the open end of the ISS.

It was, she reasoned, the closest airlock, and the most accessible. There might be another twenty UN troops inside, waiting for some Marine to pull just such a dumb stunt as this, but she wasn’t going to float helplessly by and watch Gunny Walsh’s helmet explode.

She didn’t decelerate. Holding tight to Walsh’s MMU, she stretched out with both feet and snagged the lip of the Alfa module with her boots, pivoting sharply, swinging heads over until they were facing the gaping, cave-like entryway that had been occupied moments before by the lifeboat.

Her toehold broke free and the two of them drifted past the end of the station, falling into a gentle tumble. Somehow, she managed to jockey her MMU jets until the tumble was arrested and they were moving forward once more, this time into the deeply shadowed interior of Alfa.

Both doors of the docking module lock were open, and Alfa’s interior was open to space. The first compartment, eerily empty, dark, and still, was unoccupied; a closed hatch at the far end beckoned, just visible beneath a small, orange emergency light.

“It’s no good, Lieutenant.” Walsh’s voice was harsh, close to cracking. “I’m losing pressure. The inside of my helmet is frosting over. You’d better leave me.”