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Alrighty then, here we go, chapter three of the two chapter update. Yes, I know that doesn't make sense. Hush you...

This section of the story got kind of out of hand, length wise. Just too many details to fit into two chapters. In any case, I hope you will enjoy it.

As always comments are appreciated and requested.

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Continued from 'Incident at Sython...'

11-16-3015

Time Index; 0836 hours GST

MAS Yunius

Enroute to Sython system, Merxian space

Katy sat in the cockpit of her Giryan Interceptor, her eyes closed, trying to remain relaxed. Her mind was not on the readouts displayed on her helmet's HUD, which showed that the fighter's engines were hot, the ship ready to fight. Nor was it focused on the darkened drop bay outside the cockpit, flashing red lights indicating that the bay's atmosphere was already vented, the doors ready to fly open in a heartbeat, allowing both wings of fighters to deploy within seconds of the carrier reverting to regular phase. Her mind wasn't even twined close with that of her mate, as it usually was when she had nothing to do but wait. Instead, all of her mental ability, with the exception of the tendril of thought that constantly linked her to her Terran love, was spread wide like a net, searching all over Sython, feeling for Tyr. With her awareness spread so wide, she could touch thousands of minds at once, but the touch was little more than a brush, just barely enough to recognize each mind. She had been at it for about ten minutes, and she was hoping against hope that she would touch Tyr's, as random a chance as it was. Of course, she had a better chance than almost anyone else in the galaxy of finding him. Only a class four psychic possessed the raw power, and more importantly, the mental discipline, to reach so far afield, much less touch so many minds at once; only her mate, whose powers were geared more towards that purpose, could have done more than she.

The vixen knew it was a long shot that she would find her old friend with her mind, but it was the one and only thing that was keeping her focused, keeping her from losing her mind to her anxieties. The other officers aboard ship, at least the ones that had been around long enough to learn to trust a psychic's inexplicable intuitions, were looking forward to surprising their enemy, launching a surprise attack so they could ambush the ambushers. But, while her mental powers had given her warnings like this one a few times before, just often enough for her to recognize the sensation when it happened, this was different. This time, as early as the warning had come, she was anxious; this time, she knew they might be coming too late to the battle. But the truly maddening thing was that there was nothing at all to do other than sit in her cockpit and watch the timer counting down to reversion.

From the moment she had gotten the psychic warning about her friend that had sent her carrier on this sudden mission, she had tried everything she could think of to keep her mind off the anxiety. First, she had gone down to the fighter bay and spent some time briefing her squadron leaders. Then she had spent hours going over her interceptor from nose to tail with the mechanics, checking every system, every component on the craft. Like most pilots, she had spent a good deal of her downtime after flight school in the fighter bay, learning as much as she could about maintaining her craft; after all, it was her life at stake. But there was only so much she could do in that regard, especially with a group of excellent mechanics like hers, which meant that, as the Yunius had gotten closer and closer to Sython, she had run out of things to do.

Trying to keep herself from fidgeting, she had disassembled and reassembled her carbine a couple of times while sitting on the edge of her Giryan's wing, cleaning the weapon inside and out, likewise her sidearm. Then, she had spent an hour sharpening her already sharp combat knife, the sound of the old whetstone she used instead of the standard laser sharpener making the mechanics nervous. But finally, even the old infantry tricks she knew to handle nervousness ran out and she had hopped down from her fighter, wandering around the sprawling launch bay for a while, checking on all of the new pilots under her command, trying to be reassuring, but, though the young pilots seemed to appreciate it, she was the one that really needed reassurance so that had only made the feeling worse. And finally, with an hour to go before arriving in system, she had ordered the bay cleared and secured for combat operations. With that order, the pilots and flight crews had started mounting up into their ships, the mechanics and support staff sticking around until the fighters were active and ready for launch before leaving for their action stations.

The moment the last mechanic left the bay, the Yunius' captain had announced that they would be entering the Sython system within fifteen minutes, draining the atmosphere from the bay, which meant she had been shut into her cockpit with nothing to do for long enough that the green eyed vixen was on the verge of losing her control. So instead of sitting and fidgeting, she kept her mind far afield, the search getting easier and easier as the heavy carrier got closer to its objective. And then, just as the timer on her HUD reached two minutes, her ears twitched, the vixen turning her head slightly. All of a sudden, against the odds, she felt him, the familiar consciousness on the edge of her perceptions, her mind sharpening instantly, focusing, narrowing like a sword point, enveloping the coyote with her perceptions. And, as her mind brushed up against Tyr's, she frowned, her fingers twitching in her lap. He was alive at least, but from the frantic, racing pace of his thoughts, she knew he was in trouble; desperate trouble. Frowning, she forced her thoughts to expand outward, just enough to take in the area around him, and at once, she knew that her worry was entirely justified.

Tyr was surrounded by only about a half dozen minds that were all racing just like his, but far too close for comfort, dozens of minds with far more confidence were arranged almost in a crescent, an arc that was drawing ever tighter. Worse, she could feel a small group of four that were much closer than the others, coming in towards Tyr's small group from the blind side. Her fingers twitching quickly, yearning to do something to help, Katy's heart began to beat faster and faster, knowing that her friend was about to be outflanked. If her mate had been here, he probably could have sent a warning right to Tyr's mind, but she was skilled in telekinesis, not telepathy. Then, just as the four minds coming at Tyr's blindside paused around the corner of the building, she grinned to herself, an idea blossoming in her mind.

Drawing in a breath of air enriched with pure O2 from her fighter's life support system,Katy narrowed her awareness once more, tightening it more than she ever had before, more than she ever had a need to do before. She lost touch with the minds of Tyr and his troops, focusing her powers elsewhere, touching the four infiltrators, but eschewing the touch of their minds, searching their bodies for something in particular, something small, inanimate and yet vitally important. And then, as the four soldiers paused, just around the corner from Tyr's small group, she felt it, a familiar shape in the mind's eye, molded to fit the hand, a shape attached to the armor of the one in the back of the group. Perfect, She said to herself. Pushing with all her might, she fought with the distance, struggling against it.

Distantly, she felt her body tensing up, her hands clenching into fists, heat building beneath her flight suit as she concentrated, her armor's climate control system cooling her to compensate. She could see her goal, see what she wanted to happen, but making it a reality was a very different thing. Then, just as she heard a beeping tone begin in her ears, just when her body grew so warm that it felt like it was going to burn away, she felt it, felt something beginning to shift. Her body was starting to shake, the pressure building in her chest as she pushed against it with her mind. As powerful as she was, she had never met a challenge this hard before. It felt like she was trying to lift her Giryan interceptor with her hands, a task that was wholly and completely impossible. Then, she let out a sudden gasp, a grin spreading across her lips, the pressure lifting in an instant as the surface she had been focused on shifted, a small electrical signal like a flash in the darkness indicating to her that she had succeeded in her goal. Drawing in several deep breaths to quickly calm her body, she allowed her focus to return to the cockpit, her eyes opening to the inside of her helmet.

To the best of her knowledge, no psychic in history had done what she had just done, or even tried to do it. And for a very good reason; since psychic abilities had been discovered, there had been quite a lot of experimentation and testing done, scientists attempting to find out what was possible for psychics to accomplish, what precisely they were capable of. Out of that experimentation had come the rating system that both Terrans and Merxians had adopted, and also a sense of confidence, and safety among the gifted, since they knew about where their limits lay, and knew not to try and push past them. But what was not often remembered was that during all of that research, there had been instances where the strain of attempting a task had killed the psychic, the pressure created by the effort actually bursting blood vessels in the brain.

And yet, despite the strain, despite the slightly coppery scent to every breath that indicated she had given herself a bloody nose, an indicator of how dangerously close she had just come to killing herself, she had accomplished something amazing. She had just pushed a button from millions of klicks away, an unbelievable achievement. Shaking her head as her heart calmed down to normal levels once more, she looked at the countdown on her HUD. Thirty seconds to reversion. Grinning, her hands landed on the controls of her interceptor. It was time. Keying a control on the throttle in her left hand with her thumb, Katy made the fighter lift off the deck, hovering several meters into the air, the nose pointed right at the doors. Grinning in a predatory sort of way, the vixen watched the counter in the corner of her HUD count towards zero, the other fighters in the bay all lifting off as she had, ready to form the fearsome swarm that made fighter carriers such deadly opponents...

***

11-16-3015

Time Index; 0837 hours GST

Tare Pharmaceuticals space port

Sython system, Merxian space

Tyr reached into the pouch at his hip, grabbing another magazine from inside the cloth container and slapping it quickly into the receiver of his assault rifle, pulling the bolt back even as he stood back up to take aim. From the moment he could see over the edge of the dropship's hull, the coyote was picking out a target, the muzzle of the rifle naturally following his gaze as his hands guided it into position. Before it was fully into his shoulder, his finger was already tightening on the trigger, a burst of sound and a kick accompanying the report of the bullets leaving the weapon. Almost instantly, the Black Claw he was aiming at, the one who was a moment from climbing into the gunner position on the distant Turgoun assault carrier, was sent tumbling backward, landing on his comrades who were crouching in cover behind the armored vehicle. The hard impact knocked one of the soldiers out of cover for a brief moment and the armored body twitched as it fell, juddering to a stop on the ground as Tyr's second burst, as well as a few bullets donated by the corporal standing next him, slammed into it. Both Rangers ducked swiftly down as a hail of bullets and plasma rounds splashed sparks and light against the hull that shielded them.

They had been lucky so far, far luckier than they deserved. Only one of the three assault carriers was still intact, and somehow, Tyr's tiny group had managed to keep its heavy machine gun unmanned, despite the fact that more and more Black Claws had joined the battle. The first Turgoun, the one with the heavy plasma cannon on it, had led an advance towards the dropship a few minutes earlier, and it might have gone badly for Tyr's marines, but Sergeant Gal'di had pulled off an insane shot with his grenade launcher, a shot that nobody could have duplicated a second time. The combination HE/incendiary round had made a perfect arc as it left the tube, somehow finding its way through the driver's open viewing slit, exploding inside the vehicle's armor. A half-second later, while the Marines had stared in amazement, a huge secondary explosion had ripped the vehicle apart, turning the infantry squad following right behind it into a bloody mess. The other disabled Turgoun had taken over for the first one in moments, advancing closer and closer to the crash site, machine guns spitting fire, a column of Black Claws forming behind it, the Marine's grenades exploding harmlessly against its hull. Then, just when it looked like it might drive right over the dropship, Major Tor'sek had stood up in full view of the enemy, apparently not even noticing the incoming fire, and had hurled a satchel charge right into the gunner position, an incredible throw at that distance. The resulting explosion had crumpled up the armed vehicle into a mass of burned metal and ceramic, leaving the Black Claws to scatter backward. Of course, it wasn't all good news.

Resisting the urge to look at the bodies laid out against the dropship hull, Tyr grimaced. Of the eight marines on their feet at the beginning of the fight, only Tyr, Larn and the corporal were still standing. Sergeant Gal'di had been the first to fall, the bloody hole through his faceplate a horrific sight to see. One of the privates that had only recently been assigned to the field headquarters' security unit was also dead, the victim of a Black Claw micro grenade that had blown his torso armor apart, taking most of his chest with it. The rest were lying wounded, but most still had weapons in hand, ready to defend themselves if the Black Claws got over their cover. What was more, the Marines were now completely out of explosives and quickly running out of ammunition for their assault weapons.

"Tyr," Larn called over the comm line. "We have a problem."

"We have about a hundred problems major!" Tyr replied, popping up from his crouch on the angled hull to loose another burst at the mercenaries across the tarmac, return fire again skipping around him. "Could you be more specific?"

"The Claws are massing up behind the second wreck." Larn explained, firing his machine gun in short bursts. "I think they are going to try a charge."

"Shit." Tyr exclaimed, hurrying to the huge wolf's side, leaving the corporal to keep the Black Claws off the heavy weapon of the remaining Turgoun. Sure enough, the coyote officer could see the ear tips of at least a dozen helmets sticking up from behind the crumbled mess that used to be an armored vehicle, which meant there were probably twice that many sheltering behind it. "What do you have left?"

"Maybe half a drum." Larn answered, glancing at the belt of bullets leading into his weapon's chamber. "Call it sixty rounds. Then its pistols and combat knives. You?"

"One full mag and change." Tyr answered, flicking his rifle's firing mode selector over to full auto. Normally, not even the Black Claws, brutal as they were, would consider charging across an open space into a defended position, but they had apparently been ordered to take prisoners, and since there wasn't any cover closer than the wrecked Turgoun, they didn't have much of a choice. "This isn't going to be fun."

"Oh, I dunno," The wolf quipped, sighting in on the left side of the wreck, "Could be loads of fun."

Chuckling in spite of himself, Tyr aimed his rifle for the right side of the tank, waiting, his heart hammering hard as the moments ticked by. Bare moments later, with a loud roar bellowed from dozens of throats, the Black Claws swarmed around the wreck, a rush of black armored bodies heading for the weakened Marine position. Three on the left side fell in an instant, the huge wolf's machine gun sending them sprawling. For his part, Tyr didn't spray wildly like many soldiers did when faced with a berserk charge. Instead, he kept careful control of his weapon, nudging it slightly this way and that, moving from target to target. For a moment, just a moment, it seemed like the pair might be able to hold off the charge by themselves, Black Claws tumbling to the tarmac like wheat before a scythe. But it was only a fleeting hope, barely an impression, and then, inevitably, Tyr felt it, the distinctive click-click of his rifle finding nothing in its magazine. Grimacing, Tyr dropped the rifle, knowing the enemy was too close for him to reload in time. Just as his hand closed on the grip of his sidearm, the coyote officer saw the round form of a grenade sail over the dropship's hull and bounce off the tarmac at his feet. Moving with a desperate speed, Tyr lunged for it, felt his glove close around it as it came out of its bounce and hurled his arm forward as hard as he could, muscles straining. The coyote officer had a brief glimpse of the grenade sailing towards a cluster of charging Black Claws before it exploded.

But, he had no time to celebrate his action, for a hulking Black Claw that, from its sheer bulk, could only have been an ursine, leapt over the dropship's edge, a combat shotgun in hand, already taking aim. But luck was once again on Tyr's side, for the huge bruin had misjudged the angle of the dropship's hull and stumbled as his feet came down on its lower edge, not the flat surface of the tarmac like he seemed to expect. Taking advantage of the mistake, Tyr stepped in close, grabbing the shotgun with both hands, twisting it as hard as he could, stripping it out of the grip of the bear and yanking its sling off its owner's shoulder in the same motion. Before the bear could react to the move, Tyr pulled the trigger, the blast toppling the mercenary backward against the dropship's hull. Two more Black Claws followed the first, one carrying a plasma rifle, the other an old style assault carbine, the kind the Marines used before the war, the kind that had a built in titanium-ceramic composite bayonet beneath the barrel, the sort of blade that was designed to pierce body armor. Pulling the trigger a second time, Tyr felt the semi-auto shotgun buck in his hands, the plasma armed soldier toppling forward, but his comrade was too close for another shot. Not even bothering with bullets, the Black Claw lunged with the bayonet, and Tyr reacted instinctually, bringing the shotgun up sideways across his front, catching the rifle barrel with his stolen weapon, the bayonet sticking out underneath it, the sharpened tip barely an inch from his armor.

The force of the lunge should have carried Tyr backward onto his back, where the mercenary would have all the advantages, but his counter move had redirected it to the side, carrying the pair in that direction instead, the weapons coming out of line with each other's bodies. When he felt the dropship hull slam into his back, Tyr used the sudden leverage advantage and shoved hard with his right arm, pulling in with his left, letting go of the shotgun as he did so, the mercenary's weapon going with it as the last momentum of the lunge pulled him in close to the coyote. Tyr grunted when the armored soldier's bulk landed on him shoulder first, making it hard to breathe, but he fought through the pain, slamming the top of his helmet into the soldier's faceplate, breaking it with a satisfying crackle. The mercenary turned out to be a dark furred fox with a long scar tracing the line of his muzzle, and though he was reeling from the impact, he snarled, sending a heavy fist into Tyr's armored gut. As advanced as his armor was, no one had as yet figured out how to completely negate physical impacts and he felt his breath leave his body with the hit, the knuckles connecting with the plating above his solar plexus.

The fox was strong, stronger than he was in fact, but Tyr wasn't done yet. Lashing out with adrenaline fueled strength, Tyr felt his kick connect with the mercenary's crotch, the armor there preventing serious injury, but the strike would still hurt like hell. Following the kick up with a one-two punch to his midriff, the coyote bore the fox backward, allowing him to surge back up to his feet. Then, both Marine and Mercenary seemed to remember their side arms in the same moment, both going for the grips like mirrors of one another. But before either got their weapon clear of its holster, a sharp report sounded from nearby and the Black Claw staggered, a hole appearing in his chest armor. A second report and the soldier crumpled onto his knees, slumping into a heap. Looking around, bewildered, Tyr found Captain Lyr'en grinning at him wearily from where he lay against the dropship hull, the injured pilot holding a still smoking sidearm loosely in his shaking hand.

Returning the grin, Tyr reached for the shotgun, finding that it was still operational, only a scratch on the barrel indicating that it had saved his life and heaved a heavy sigh of relief. Looking around for an opponent, Tyr saw that the situation wasn't as bad as it had looked at first. Only a few mercenaries had made it over the dropship hull, and Larn was holding the last one who was on his feet in the air above his head, the giant's powerful arms hurling the struggling soldier over the dropship to land on his neck a good ten feet beyond it, the soldier collapsing into a motionless heap. But, even as Tyr was taking stock of the situation, he caught movement out of the corner of his eye and he turned to find four more Black Claws coming around the corner of the building from behind their position, weapons already taking aim on the standing Marines. The Colonel raised his shotgun, knowing he was already too late to stop them, but even as he moved, he noticed that the fourth mercenary, the one at the back of the group, was doing something odd, frantically tugging at a grenade clipped to his combat harness, his movements panicked, the small activation light on the top blinking. Then, the four soldiers disappeared in a bright explosion that dazzled the Ranger commander, making him wince. When the light cleared, the small group of infiltrators were gone, consumed by the grenade's blast. Breathing a sigh of relief and thanks to whatever force in the universe had triggered the grenade prematurely, Tyr slumped back against the hull for a moment, wincing a bit as he forced his lungs to fill smoothly, despite the bruise that he could almost feel forming on his chest.

"That was lucky." Larn said, settling down beside him. "You alright?"

"Yeah." Tyr confirmed, forcing himself to get back up onto his feet, slinging the shotgun across his back and going to fetch his assault rifle from where he had dropped it. "That was way too close."

"Sir!" The Corporal called and Tyr turned to find the young soldier pointing over the dropship's hull once more, still aiming his rifle despite the fact that he had apparently caught a bullet during the close fight, his right arm sheeted with blood. Crawling back up the sloping hull to lie beside the noncom, reloading the rifle as he did so, Tyr looked over the edge and swore . The last Turgoun carrier was in motion once again, a gunner in place despite their best efforts to stop it. And that meant that the rest of the Black Claws would be following. If it got much closer, there was no way the Marines would survive the assault, the machine gun able to fill their cover with high caliber rounds. But, they also had no way to stop the thing without some sort of explosive. Larn crawled up beside them as well a moment later, an assault rifle in hand, his empty machine gun slung across his back, the other weapon looking somehow small in his hands by comparison.

Then, just when the light tank was closing in, just as they were preparing to go out fighting, the trio heard a familiar whoosh come from somewhere behind them. Quicker than the eye could follow, a rocket flew past the dropship, the smoke trail connecting it with the advancing armored vehicle. Unlike the grenades they had had to use before, the rocket was designed to cut through tank armor, and the explosion from its impact scattered pieces of Turgoun over a wide radius, throwing mercenaries around like ragdolls. Turning to look where the shot had come from, the trio found soldiers hurrying into the cover offered by the dropship, soldiers clad in the distinctive armor of Rangers. One of them, wearing the gold diamonds of a lieutenant on his armor, hurried up to where they were lying, and the two officers slumped down gratefully, the corporal finally checking his wounded arm while they greeted the newcomer.

"Boy, are you a sight for sore eyes." Tyr commented, holding out his hand to Lieutenant Quinit.

"Sorry Colonel." The leopard officer replied over the sound of his soldiers firing on the rapidly retreating Black Claws. "We would have been here sooner but my dropship took some fire and we had to land a little farther away than we would have liked."

"Well you showed up just in the nick of time." Larn said, looking around as if counting heads. "Where is the rest of your company?"

"B and C platoons are moving in on the main terminal with First Company's D platoon." The lieutenant reported, "My D platoon landed off target too and is making its way there as fast as they can. I also found something you lost." Nodding in the direction the Rangers had come from, the lieutenant indicated a pair of corpsman coming around the corner, leading the missing three members of Tyr's unit, as well as the dropship's crew chief, most of them helping each other walk, or in a couple cases, hobble.

"Good to see you guys." Tyr said, taking another deep breath of relief. That was one less thing for him to worry about. "Now we are getting somewhere."

As the corpsmen began tending to the wounded scattered around the crash site, Tyr and his XO took a moment to restock their ammunition from the supplies the platoon had brought and take stock of themselves. Aside from what felt like a bruised sternum, Tyr was alright, and the only indication that Larn had even been in a fight was a few light scuffs on his armor. The huge wolf was also almost indecently cheerful, joking with a few of the newcomers even as he loaded a new drum into his machine gun, apparently not even noticing that they had all come within inches of death. Finally Tyr looked around, surprised; everything was quiet, aside from the distant sounds of the firefights raging at different points around the spaceport. The remaining Black Claws that had been engaging Tyr's group had fallen back upon seeing reinforcements come up. Moving up to look over the edge of the dropship's hull once more, Tyr looked across the tarmac towards the strange garage in the distance, the distinctive nest of sensors on the roof visible even from that distance. The Black Claws seemed to be concentrating there, falling back from positions all over the space port, which meant it was indeed more important than simply a place where they stored vehicles.

"What is the plan now Colonel?" Quinit asked, coming up so he was next to his CO.

"That building in the distance there has got to be some sort of command and control building for the mercs." Tyr said, pointing. "We need to either take it out, or capture it."

"I don't think we have enough men here to do that." Quinit commented, looking where Tyr indicated and shaking his head. "And my entire company together doesn't have the fire power to take it out."

"Maybe not, but without fire support, it's the only option we have." Tyr continued. "We will leave a fire team here with one of the corpsman as a casualty collection point. Its protected enough. The rest of us will have to make a move before the Black Claws get organized again."

"We're with you, Colonel." The leopard replied. The other Rangers all gave a nod of acknowledgement, getting ready to move. Then, just as Tyr was about to lead the way forward, a soft crackle came over his comm unit, the sort of sound that came from a another transmitter connecting on a secured frequency. Perplexed, the coyote held his hand up for a halt and activated the required circuit with the control built into his left forearm.

"This is Turlion zero-one." He called, "Is anyone receiving?"

"Turlion zero-one, this is Turlion Two-one." A voice answered and Tyr raised his eyebrows. Turlion Two-one was the comm designation used by Captain Saros, Second Company's commanding officer and the next ranking officer in the battalion behind Tyr and Larn. "We are inbound and hot with the rest of the battalion. Where do you want us?"

"Come down on this transmission and watch for anti-aircraft fire." Tyr commanded and he heard the other officer acknowledge the order. Waving his rangers back into cover, Tyr looked over at Larn and the pair shared a feral grin. The balance of the battalion was almost four companies worth of soldiers, which should give them more than enough manpower to overtake the Black Claws' command center. But, even as they settled in to wait for reinforcements, Tyr knew that the entire battalion deploying at once meant more than just an influx in combat power for the engagement. The other companies of the Turlion Rangers had been on standby aboard the Adaron. Which could only mean that, since they had launched all at once without his order, things were not going well in orbit. 'Still,' Tyr reflected, 'Better to be on the ground fighting than to be helpless in a space battle...'