Hotston slipped down behind a wall, joining the rest of his platoon in huddling down.

‘Bastards are tenacious aren’t they?’ he said, grinning at them. Although it was more like a baring of teeth. They’d only managed to proceed for about a kilometre from the ambush site before the first signs of pursuit had appeared. ‘We’ve got two klicks to the EP. We need to get them off our arse.’

‘You got a plan boss?’ Watson asked. She looked utterly drained, and if her stamina was a low as his was showing on his own HUD, things were going to get worse. If her bar hit 50%, her movement speed would be affected, and she’d also find it harder to aim, and slower to reload. Her grenade throwing distance would also be reduced. She – along with everyone else – would gradually become more and more ineffective.

And then we’ll die, Hotston thought bitterly. Fuck that.

He’d be damned if he was going to let any more of his people die. And if they did have to die, he was going to make sure that the ChinKor paid heavily for every death.

‘Yeah, I’ve got a plan. See that house at the head of the T-junction?’ He pointed just in case she wasn’t aware. It was a terraced house, in the middle of a row of four. ‘The ChinKor are heading along this road, probably hoping to push us into another force. And that’s not happening.’

‘What do you want to do?’ she asked once she’d taken a look.

‘Set up with your people in that house. You’ll have a clear line of fire down the road. I’m going to set second squad at this point, and third here. Second will form an ell shape with you. Third will be further out and will engage the rear of the enemy.’

‘How are we going to draw them in?’ she asked as she looked at the markers he’d added to the tacmap.

‘I’m going to make my presence known by firing a medi-vac flare. It’s fine as we know there’s fuck-all friendly air. They might not know that. Which will mean they’ll be itching to get a juicy target.’

‘Woah, you’re going to put yourself out as bait? Gasped Winnie, dramatically raising a hand to her mouth. He couldn’t tell if she was being sarcastic or genuine. It didn’t matter, he didn’t need her messing with his confidence. Putting himself directly out there so that enemy forces could walk into an ambush, was going against every survival instinct he had.

‘Yeah. I need you to be with third. That position should allow you to shoot both sides of the convoy. With fire from Watson’s house and second, we’ll have a nice kill zone sorted.’

She frowned, but didn’t say anything further. Glad he wasn’t going to have to argue the point, he hashed out the finer details. ‘Good to go?’

They nodded.

‘We’ve got two missiles left. I want one with third, and one with Watson. Vida, Third will initiate the ambush. Take out the rear the vehicle. As soon as that happens, Watson’s launcher will take out the lead vehicle. Watson’s mortar people will then drop all the rounds they have left. The road’s narrow enough to keep the convoy trapped. We need to stop them from getting into any of the houses lining the street, so use grenades as improvised booby traps.’

‘What’s the withdraw signal?’ asked Vida.

‘I’ll send up a green flare. Rally point is here,’ he marked the rally point on the tacmap. ‘One hundred metres. We’ll then set up a firing line and engage any dismounts that decide to follow us.’

*

It was a simple plan, and had only taken them 10 frantic minutes to get things in place. Hotston stood in the middle of the street, looking back towards from where he thought the enemy should come. Palms sweating, he popped a red flare into the flare gun, took a steadying breath, then fired it into the air. There was a surprisingly powerful kick, a whoosh, and then the flare was racing up into the sky. At roughly three hundred metres, much further than he thought it would have travelled, it burst – literally – into life. Bright red, it hung, slowly descending on a small parachute.

‘Enemy spotted,’ whispered Winnie, somewhat unnecessarily since the enemy wouldn’t hear her over the platoon net.

‘Four light armoured vehicles, Humvee pattern. One command, three top gunner. Estimate five troopers each one. Tagging,’ said Vida. In under a second all of the hostile vehicles were marked with red target indicators. ‘They’re coming on fast and dumb.’

Hotston licked his lips. In what seemed like no time the enemy vehicles appeared around the corner, the top gunner of the lead vehicle swaying with the speed of the turn.

Dropping to his knee, Hotston took a shaky breath, held it for a split second, breathed out, held that, and fired. He didn’t hit anyone. But he did get their attention. Tracer raced out towards him. It fell short, carving the road apart, throwing debris up to a metre in the air.

‘Run!’ ordered Winnie. Not waiting to argue, he turned and ran to second squad’s position. More incoming fire chased his heels. The sound of flash boiling road surface behind him added wings to his heels. As the howl of the LAV’s powerful electric motors.

Reaching the T-junction, he took a sharp right. Bricks and mortar showered him, the enemy shots barely slowing as they punched through the house wall.

‘Fuck!’ he slipped just as he made it around the corner, crashing into the hard pavement. Stars exploded before his eyes as his head smacked off the ground.

STUNNED!

NEW TITLE! GLASS JAW – AWARDED WHEN YOU’VE TAKEN ONE TOO MANY HITS TO THE HEAD

Even getting onto all fours was an effort. The world span, and his stomach rebelled. Bile forced its way out, spattering on the pavement before him. Arms weak, he collapsed onto the ground as wave after wave of dizziness washed over him.

‘Boss! Where are you!’ called out Watson.

‘Firing!’ Vida warned. Somewhere there was a sharp explosion. ‘Last vehicle hit! Mobility kill!’

‘Firing!’ Watson replied a split second later. The explosion was closer, so much so that he felt the effects of the blast. A solitary wheel bounced along the road before coming to a rest below Watson’s position. Hotston was still unable to do anything. Every time he tried to stand, he vomited. Dizziness like he’d never experienced overwhelmed him.

‘Medic,’ he croaked. Somewhere, buried deep beneath the nausea, dizziness, and the crashing headache that had descended from nowhere, an inner voice screamed at him to get up and back into the fight. To lead his people. Only he couldn’t. It felt as though someone was squeezing his brain to a beat only they could hear. ‘Medic.’

‘I’ve got you,’ someone said. Something both blunt, but yet sharp, punched into his thigh. A pause, and then bliss. The world stopped spinning, his stomach settled, and the headache disappeared just as quickly as it had come.

The medic didn’t wait for this to happen of course. As soon as they had used the nano-needle they were hauling him off the road and into a building. It was then that he became aware of the sounds of battle. A pulser had gone cyclic, blasting away with absolutely no care about overheating, draining the battery, or melting the barrel.

Shouted orders filled the net, and the building he was in. No one sounded panicked, which he took as a good sign. And then there was silence.

‘You good?’ It was the medic, a woman called Dobbs. Not waiting for an answer she grabbed his chin, then shone a light into his eyes. ‘Look left, look right, look up, look down. Okay, you’re good.’

She gave a couple of non-too-gentle pats on his chest armour.

‘Watson, Vida, you up?’

‘Jesus, where the fuck have you been?’ Vida replied, his relief evident in his voice.

‘Taking a nap,’ laughed Watson. ‘He got a bit puffed out running away from the nasty enemy.’

‘Yeah, yeah. What’s the situation?’ Hotston was surprised at how happy they seemed to be to have him back. Either one of them would be more than capable of leading the ad-hoc platoon themselves.

‘All enemy KIA. Lead and front vehicles were totalled,’ Vida said. ‘We can salvage the middle two. They didn’t take too much damage.’

‘Our losses?’ Hotston held his breath, dreading the answer.

‘Zero. Couple of light injuries. Nothing too serious. We’re good to go boss.’

Hotston tried standing. He still felt a little woozy, but the STUNNED debuff had gone.

Plan went better than I thought, which made him feel good. His people were alive, the enemy were dead, and they had transport again.

‘Okay, get everyone in to the vehicles and let’s get to this fucking supply depot!’