Tevun-Krus #100

76 - Ixion - @HC_Leung - Military SF

Ixion

by HC_Leung

The future, as they say, is now.

Thanks to time travel, forty thousand three hundred and thirty years feel like an instant.

And the human forces are here. Above Thegawa, a volcanic planet in the outskirts of the Andromeda Galaxy, Earth Coalition warship Hermes orders its fleet to attack.

"All ships, initiate Operation Cold Razor. Glory for all mankind!"

The ships open their cargo bays. Once the ramps are lowered, countless Infantry Orbital Tactical Assault pods dangle above the dark, ash-filled sky. The enemy's planetary defense system greets the humans with plasma shots, setting off explosions in the fleet formation.

Warnings blare through the comms. Coventry is hit, and Glasgow is suffering fusion drive malfunction. The soldiers clench their teeth and hold their rifles. Some say their prayers, while some cry for their loved ones at home.

Sergeant Shoji "Mad Dog" Misawa has nothing to fear. To him, life and death are part of the natural order. He checks his vitals; his heart rate and adrenaline level are both normal. He smirks a little. After the intergalactic travel, he is eager to touch down and kill.

Exosuit: activated. All systems online. The 2nd Special Forces Brigade is ready to drop. Docking clamps will be released in five, four, three...

In the year of our Lord 2035, a Mars rover mission discovered the ruins of an ancient city. In the heart of its intrinsic grid, there was a pyramid. Its chambers were inscribed with Egyptian hieroglyphs.

The rover took pictures and transmitted them back to Earth. Archaeologists deciphered the content and found descriptions of a native civilization. The Martians, as we called them, were a peaceful and space-faring nation, whose footprint spanned from Earth's Nile River to the moons of Jupiter. Their existence came to a halt, however, when the Xions entered the Solar System.

The violent, hive-minded cyborgs were ruled by King Ixion, a reclusive figure from the future. Martians knew little of him, except he had been ailing, and his army had been scouring the universe for a cure.

The Martians were massacred during their first encounter. Their bodies were boiled down to genetic raw materials for the cure. In less than a year, their nation had fallen. The pyramid inscriptions ended when their species were driven to extinction.

Frantic, Earth's governments got together. The Xions would surely return, and humans must have the means to defend themselves. In 2037, the world became one nation. The Earth Coalition adopted Martian technology and began building space war vessels.

In 2047, Earth's spy satellites detected a wormhole near Callisto. It was new, stable, and wide enough for an armada to pass through. The Xions were coming. History was about to repeat itself.

But Earth had something Mars did not. It had the element of surprise, the opportunity to strike first and bring war to the enemy's doorstep.

Operation Cold Razor. Earth's naval task force, comprising cruisers and spacecraft carriers, set sail from Luna. Once they arrive at the spatial anomaly, the ships delved in immediately. For the first time in human history, war is waged in the future in another galaxy.

...two...one.

"2nd Brigade, let's go! See you on the other side!"

The clamps are released, and the squad is dropped from orbit. The moment Misawa's IOTA pod pierces into the stratosphere, the nacelle around him shakes violently. 9G. His organs feel weightless and threaten to exit his body.

He sees a flash outside the tiny window, followed by more. Hundreds, thousands of troops are free-falling past the anti-air fire. The Norwegians, Malaysians, South Africans...all the nations are fighting as one fist.

Trajectory: Normal. Descend Speed: 75 km/s. The onboard guidance computer glides Misawa towards the designated impact zone. Soon, he sees the clouds, the soot, and the ashes that perpetually layer the lower atmosphere. A hostile world, eons in the future, where no life is nurtured but the lava flows.

The pod's vector thrust system kicks in when Misawa is near the ground. Touch down. Micro-detonation occurs between the structural seams, and the nacelle cracks apart. Smoke. Dust. The pungent gunpowder smell. The soldiers from the 2nd Brigade emerge from their shells.

"Take cover!" someone shouts before his face is shot.

Misawa ducks behind a boulder. A hail of bullets sweeps through between him and his squad. Three o'clock, hundred yards out, a Xion rapid pulse gun on the high ground. The 2nd Brigade is pinned down.

A human smoke grenade is thrown, and soon their position is obscured. Misawa produces his HK-416 assault rifle, modified with an all-spectrum Martian gun scope. He sees past the smoke. A string of hieroglyphs tells him there are five Xion cyborgs.

So he takes aim, holds his breath, and pulls the trigger. The 5.56 mm rounds slither through the Thegawan air and splash their intended target.

All clear. The soldiers come out from their cover. Misawa checks his holo-map to reorient himself.

As the war blankets the land, the sound of gunfire looms around them. Some are distant, some within earshot, but all of them are intense and continuous. Above the horizon, Hermes is conducting orbital bombardment. To their left, aerial fighters are firing missiles at Xion eight-legged tanks.

Everyone is doing their part, so the 2nd Brigade must carry on. Their mission is to bring the Xion army to its knees by neutralizing the source of the hive mind, King Ixion himself.

The King's palace, which resembles a glass cube, is within sight. Misawa makes a forward gesture, and his squad moves out in a single-line formation. All alert. The path is full of elite Xion imperial guards, but the 2nd Brigade must overcome the odds. Operation Cold Razor is running on a clock. King Ixion's head must roll before sundown.

Misawa smirks a little. Life and death. They are all part of the natural order.