Direct Fire #4 Drop Trooper

need to make sure we close off avenues of attack to prevent the Tahni from making an end-run assault on the Solar System to try to draw our forces away.”
She traced a line on her ‘link and bits of space lit up in red.
“The Tahni are quite aware of this, and the system is heavily defended in the area around Port Harcourt.” A baleful glare scanned over us. “This is going to be the most heavily fortified system we’ve hit so far, be forewarned. However, the Fleet is fully committed to this mission and will be bringing along three cruisers and every available carrier for the assault.” She spread her hands. “They’ll clear the way for us as best as they can, but the approach is still going to be a nightmare. Even after we drop, there’s going to be significant enemy air assets to get through. All five battalions of the 187th Expeditionary Force will be involved in the operation. There is no other military target, we are all in on this one, ladies and gentlemen.”
“Question, ma’am.” Captain Geiger, Bravo Company commander. I didn’t know her other than her name, but she had a steady, thoughtful demeanor. “I understand we need control of the system, but have you been given any guidance as to why we’re not bypassing the planet altogether? As you said, it’s a huge commitment of troops and once the Fleet has taken out their space assets, what’s the strategic importance of controlling the population?”
I forced myself not to cringe, but I wanted to, not because it was a bad question but because it was a good one, which usually made it a forbidden one. It was an old debate I’d heard over many a burn barrel and after-hours round of beers. Ground troops had been needed to retake our occupied colonies because we had to think about the lives of the captive colonists. But ever since we’d taken the last of them back, the world we were standing on, the talk had begun again.
“We should just wipe all of them out,” Cronje declared, not quite loud enough to reach Voss.
“The decision has been made,” Voss said, resorting to that old passive voice officers used when they didn’t want to blame stupid decisions on the high command or, worse yet, the President, “that it’s crucial to the prosecution of this phase of the war for the Tahni populace to truly accept their defeat. The last thing we want is to fight this war again in another twenty or thirty years. If we leave their population with their ground defenses and their pride intact, with humans never setting foot in their cities, they’ll never believe they’ve been beaten.” She shrugged. “Of course, the alternative would be to simply devastate their cities from orbit, and there have been calls to do exactly that, but so far, anyway, the President has resisted any such suggestions because it would be against the rules of war to kill noncombatants.”
“No Tahni is a noncombatant,” Cronje muttered, apparently unconcerned whether his subordinates heard him doubting higher command. “They’re all a bunch of fucking fanatics.”
And I couldn’t really disagree. But…
“If we bombard their planets,” I said softly aside to Vicky, “they could do the same thing to ours, and then there’d be nothing left for either of us.” I shrugged. “And I don’t know if I could live with myself being part of slaughtering a bunch of civilians.”
She regarded me with an expression flatly cool, not as if she were angry with me but more that she considered what I’d said to be irrelevant to her.
“I’m more worried,” she declared, “about my Marines than I am their civilians.”
I couldn’t really disagree with that either. It seemed even more reasonable burning in hot at six gravities of boost, with hellfire burning all around me.
“Two minutes until orbital insertion,” the dropship’s crew chief contributed, always trying to be helpful.
Not drop, just orbital insertion. At least then, we could stop worrying about possibly catching a round from the space defense satellites and start thinking about the fighters flying to intercept us, and air defense turrets shooting at us from the ground. That would be so much better.
I switched to the platoon net and said something just to hear myself talk. Well, and also because it didn’t hurt to remind them all of the objective just in case their leadership got themselves killed and one of them had to step up. I was living proof that wasn’t impossible.
“Remember,” I told them, “our target is the deflector dishes at the spaceport. We take them down and the assault shuttles have a clear shot at their defense turrets and can provide us with air support. Our job is to clear the way for the company Boomers to come in and blow the shit out of them. Fourth Platoon is securing our left flank and Alpha Company is on our right. We got no reserves unless and until we take out those deflectors, so the objective comes first.”
“In other words,” Bang-Bang said, breaking in on my monologue, “don’t be looking for someone to hold your fuckin’ hand if the going gets rough. This is our fuckin’ job and we’re gonna do it.”
I snorted a quiet laugh. Gunnery Sgt. Bernie ‘Bang-Bang’ Morrel had stepped into the platoon sergeant’s spot in my unit after Scotty Hayes died and it hadn’t been easy to get used to someone other than Scotty helping me run the platoon. But Bang-Bang hadn’t tried to be Scotty. He’d just been himself and the difference was enough to make it easier to deal with Scotty not being there.
“Hold on,” the crew chief warned us. “We got incoming fighters. The assault shuttles are engaging, but we might have to do some evasive maneuvering.”
“Oh, great,” I murmured, making sure my mic was off. “Evasive maneuvering is my favorite thing.”
I must be a glutton for punishment because I tied back into the external cameras. The curve of the planet took