Tarik received Razek's message two days earlier. He was glad he translated the message from Vulcan himself; the Universal Translator may have missed several nuances of meaning critical to the mission. That was good thinking on Wallace's part, he thought. Translating the message into a language the Jem'Hadar don't know, and using a native speaker to do so.
Tarik, Boyle, and Anderson sat down and drew up an operations plan. The Hammerheads would strike first, hitting the communications relay at the moon of the third planet in the Morristown system. Tarik and Anderson would land shortly thereafter; Anderson leading one platoon against the moon and Tarik leading two platoons against Morristown itself. The objective was to push the Jem'Hadar and their Mullara allies out of the system while keeping the settlements intact for recolonization.
VMF-58 preceeded three Hawke armored personnel transports into the system, its blue supergiant central star casting a spectral glow across its seven planets.
An encoded signal from Boyle's Hammerhead reached Tarik's communications display aboard the lead Hawke. [Hammerheads are go!] Boyle reported.
"Happy hunting, Major," Tarik replied.
"Hammerhead One to all elements--split-S on my mark. Acknowledge," Major
Boyle snapped into his comm circuit.
"Split-S on your mark," Captain Morgan Bacardi, the squadron executive officer and Boyle's wingman, replied.
"Acknowledged," the other three pilots answered.
The fighters peeled off and made their run at the moon. Boyle got off the first shot, his phasers incinerating the base power plant. Bacardi moved in on the communications relay, which had a backup generator that could also keep the entire base operational. Suddenly four cruciform vessels with crescent-shaped wings launched from the moon's surface.
"Bogeys in the air! Bogeys in the air!" Bacardi called out.
"Acknowledged--landing party, stay on station!" Boyle ordered.
"Shit! They've got fighters here!" Tarik said as soon as the message came in. "Probably Mullara fighters--I've never seen that configuration before!"
[Sensors aren't locking in on them,] Anderson replied from his transport. [They must have some sort of dampening field.]
"Terrific! Let's hope the fighters can hold them off!"
Suddenly Tarik was getting a dread feeling that this mission was going to be even less of a cakewalk than he expected.
"Four against five. Are you sure these Mullara fighters are everything we've been told?" the second-in-command of the Jem'Hadar communications relay asked his superior.
"Against the Banshee-class fighers we've known are in this sector for some time, I would be certain," the officer replied. "Against this new configuration, I don't know. They don't seem as sturdy as the Banshees, but they are more maneuverable. Have we gotten a warning off to the base at Prime Colony?"
"Aye, sir--we were able to deliver a message via tachyon burst to Prime just before the enemy destroyed the relay."
"Good. We shall not make the same idiotic mistakes the Son'a made in this sector!"
Talia Tigre in Hammerhead Four rolled out of the gunsights of the Mullara fighter pursuing her and reversed thrust. The Jem'Hadar pilot, just inexperienced enough with the Mullara fighter to slow his reactions, wasn't ready for the reversal of fortune. Talia depressed her firing stud and sent several phaser bursts lancing through the enemy ship.
"Scratch one!" she yelled as she brought her Hammerhead up in a victory roll.
[Don't get cocky!] Boyle snapped back as he sighted in on another enemy fighter. The fighter had managed to get a shot off at Lucas in Hammerhead Five. Five's engines were out and Lucas was rapidly being drawn in by the moon's gravity. [Cover Lucas!]
Ground fire was starting to add its voice to the game. Talia broke off and began strafing the heavy phaser emplacements. Theoretically, Hammerhead Five could stay in orbit long enough for the raiding party to pull Lucas out...if he didn't get shot down completely first.
[qapla'!] Morgan shouted into his circuit as another of the Mullara fighters vanished in a ball of rapidly-expanding plasma.
Shannon Vansen in Hammerhead Three sighted in one of the remaining two fighters, which was attempting to break through to the transports. "Come on, you son of a bitch!" she snarled as she struggled to acquire the Mullara fighter in her targeting sights. The fighter's sensor dampening field was suppressing the ship's engine signature. This one would have to be brought in via Mark I Eyeball.
"Computer, deactivate targeting computer. Release weapons to manual control," Shannon ordered. A tone in her comm circuit signaled acknowledgement.
[Vansen, what the hell are you doing?] Boyle demanded.
"The only thing that makes sense," she said as she managed to lock the fighter in via her heads-up display. An impulse-driven photon missile went straight up the Mullara's tailpipe. The ship exploded before it could even reach the Hawkes.
The remaining fighter also made a run for the transports, but Boyle ended that before it began. [Hammerheads to landing party--commence landing!] he signalled.
"Okay, that's our signal!" Tarik ordered. "Transports are to stay on station and provide fire support! This LZ is now hot!"
Anderson in Hawke Two broke off for the moon while Tarik took Hawkes One and Three to Morristown. The battle was now fifteen minutes old.
Tarik's transport set down about half a kilometer from the Morristown settlement. "All right, Marines! Over the side!" he yelled as he jumped out the side hatch of the Hawke. Twenty Marines joined him as the transport's guns laid down a suppressing fire against the Jem'Hadar defenders. Then everything went wrong.
Amongst the Federation weapons supplied to the colony illegally was a photon anti-tank weapon. A clever Jem'Hadar decided that the weapon could also be used against the gunship and fired. A split-second later Hawke One was completely destroyed.
"Everybody down!" Tarik yelled. "Hawke Three, pull out! I say again, pull out!"
[Aye, sir. Pulling out to stratosphere,] the pilot of the second transport responded. While powerful, the anti-tank weapon had a very limited range.
Tarik opened his tricorder and scanned the defenses. The tricorder wasn't working. Damn--they've got the same masking field over their fortifications as well! Then, another question came unbidden: How long have they had this field? Can Razek's information even be trusted at this point?
No time to worry about that now. "Advance by squads--leapfrog. Fire as you advance," he ordered as the Jem'Hadar continued to fire. A Marine to Tarik's right was vaporized.
The landing area was an agricultural field of some sort, approaching harvest at the time the Jem'Hadar and Mullara had attacked Morristown. Grain-like plants nearly two meters high obscured Tarik's forward view, and without the tricorder he couldn't tell what was ahead of him.
"Hawke Three--give me a visual on the town. What have we got?"
A gunner aboard Hawke Three gave Tarik a report using hand-held optical scanners. [It looks like they've got earthworks thrown up at the outskirts of town, sir. I see twenty Jem'Hadar manning the trenches. You've got maybe one hundred and fifty meters between you and the town.]
"Where's that anti-tank weapon?"
[I don't see him--wait! In a trench one hundred meters ahead of you, fifteen degrees azimuth from your position.]
"Hawke Three, I need a fire mission!" Tarik ordered, giving the approximate coordinates and knowing he was dooming the landing craft.
[Acknowledged,] the transport pilot answered as he began his descent.
Tarik was about to organize a squad to rush the trenches when a Jem'Hadar appeared out of the growth, as surprised to see Tarik as Tarik was to see him.
Tarik attempted to bring up his rifle but the Jem'Hadar knocked it out of his hands. Tarik rolled out of the way just as his opponent fired his phaser, setting fire to the tall grass. Bringing his legs around, he managed to knock the Jem'Hadar down.
The Jem'Hadar grabbed Tarik's leg and would not let go, shouting and growling incoherently. Looks like I'm going to have to do this the hard way, he thought as he drew his knife. The Jem'Hadar jumped onto Tarik, picking him up by the breastplate of his armor and throwing him several meters.
This can only mean one thing, Tarik thought as he got back up and rushed at the Jem'Hadar. This time he speared the massive warrior in the gut, stunning him long enough for Tarik to slit his throat and brain stem. Tarik checked his dead opponent's Ketracel White vial. It was empty--and looked to have been empty for quite some time.
[Hawke Three to Group Leader--I can't get a visual fix! The smoke's too thick and the dampening field is still up!]
Tarik caught his breath. "Stay on station and fire at targets of opportunity. How bad is this fire?"
[Looks like thirty hectares along an east-west axis. This sucker's gonna burn for days with all that wheat down there!] the pilot replied.
Tarik checked his helmet display. So far he'd lost four Marines. "The four of you closest to me, make your way to my position," he ordered. Moments later four Marines looking very much the worse for wear made it to Tarik's position.
"I'm going for the anti-tank position," he said. "You four have just been volunteered. These boys are runnng low on Ketracel White, so they're going to be a lot nastier than usual!"
"NOW he tells us!" one of the men, a corporal, replied.
The four men began moving rapidly in the general direction of the anti-tank weapon. Tarik heard another shot issue forth from the weapon; thankfully this one didn't connect with its target. Good. The smoke's confusing them as much as it is us!
They made it to within fifty meters of the emplacement when a loud explosion went off to Tarik's right. He turned to see the smart-aleck corporal from thirty seconds ago laying on the ground, screaming, both of his legs off above the knees.
"Mines! Hold your positions! Everyone hold your positions!" he yelled over the comm circuit. "Corpsman to my position!"
The corpsman, fortunately, was nearby and rushed over, working frantically as he spoke to Tarik. "We're going to have to get him out of here, sir. I've stabilized him but I don't know how long he's going to make it."
"Hawke Three, casualty to beam up!" Tarik ordered. The double amputee vanished.
The wind began to blow the smoke away from the earthworks. The Jem'Hadar holding the anti-tank weapon began to sight in on the transport. Tarik grabbed the fallen corporal's rifle and shot the enemy trooper down. Then he pulled a grenade off his harness and hurled it toward that general location. Another Jem'Hadar trying to retrieve the weapon was disintegrated in the blast. Then, Tarik had an idea. Switching over to an encrypted frequency, he contacted the transport.
"Hawke Three, this is Group Leader. Beam up as many of us as you can on my mark."
[Aye, sir], the beleagured pilot replied.
Then, on an open circuit: "All Marines, retreat! Repeat, this is a retreat! Gather the wounded and prepare for immediate evac!"
Meanwhile, on the moon of the third planet in the system, Lieutenant John Anderson's raiding party was also meeting with stiff opposition. Hawke Two had survived the initial insertion and was providing covering fire while two of the Hammerheads vectored in on Morristown. Anderson had managed to burn through the control circuit for an access tunnel and was leading his troops into the underground compound.
The men leapfrogged their way into the compound, meeting fierce opposition from the Jem'Hadar manning the outpost. Anderson also noted that the Jem'Hadar warriors had run out of Ketracel White, but had no way of notifying anyone of this information. >From the third planet's perspective, Morristown was behind the system's central star and no communication between the two bodies was possible.
It was a very tight fit, but the thirty-two survivors of the initial landing were all sandwiched aboard Hawke Three. "All right, despite what you may have heard, we're not leaving," Tarik said. "We're going to beam down just behind the enemy lines. It's risky, but we'll get past the mine field that way and they won't be expecting it. Hammerheads Two and Four are vectoring in on our position; they should be here in a few minutes. On my signal, we push into town and let the fighters mop up the trenches with strafing fire."
The Marines, down but hardly out, shouted assent. "Okay, beam us down!" Tarik yelled to the pilot.
One of the door gunners laid down suppressing fire as the Marines began beaming down behind the Jem'Hadar fortifications. The defensive line broke and began falling back toward the town, just as Tarik suspected. They might be more vicious without the Ketracel White, but their judgement is also impaired.
The Marines, now with the upper hand, began giving back the beating they'd gotten in the initial landing as Hawke Three pulled out. The reserve force began pouring out of Morristown itself while the transport began firing upon the barracks compound in the town. Soon the Jem'Hadar had closed ranks around the raiding force and fighting went hand to hand.
The next five minutes were all a haze to Tarik as he fought off one Jem'Hadar after the other with his knife and the butt of his rifle. He recalled a knife entering his thigh but thought nothing of it as he kept fending off one attacker after another. Suddenly two sonic booms caught everyone by surprise.
[Hammerhead Two to Group Leader--do you copy?] Morgan Bacardi commed on Tarik's circuit.
"This is Group Leader. Commence fire mission on following coordinates!" Tarik said as he called off the map grid.
[Sir, that's right on top of your position!] Talia protested.
"I'm very much aware of that, Lieutenant," Tarik said as he grappled with another Jem'Hadar. "Now fly the mission!"
[Aye, sir]
Moments later, Tarik and his opponent were knocked off their feet as Hammerhead Two began firing phasers into the earthworks and onto the troops advancing from the town. Hammerhead Four peeled off and attacked the colony's power plant some four kilometers east.
The Jem'Hadar began falling back, their fortunes having suddenly turned. The last thing Tarik remembered seeing was a bright flash to the east...
"Direct hit on the power plant! I say again, direct hit on the power plant! Estimated yield 25 kilotons!" Talia said as she pulled her fighter up out of the attack run. A shockwave was already ripping through Morristown.
[Hawke Three to Hammerheads, attempting evac! Cover me!]
The transport moved in close enough to beam up the surviving Marines, then flew out of the hot zone as quickly as possible.
"Sir, are you all right?" a corpsman asked Tarik as he awoke groggily.
"What happened?" he asked.
"The colony's power plant detonated. Most of the town was destroyed. Any Jem'Hadar left down there are probably going to be dead of radiation poisioning in a few days," the corpsman replied as he applied a hypospray. "That's hyronalyn. It should mitigate the radiation poisoning. We had more than enough for everyone but none of us are going to be 100 percent for a couple of days."
Tarik boosted himself up, only to have his leg go out on him. "You may want to stay down for a bit, sir. Your femoral artery was severed; we got you just in time. The radiation was the least of your worries!"
"Open up a comm channel."
"Channel open, sir," the pilot of Hawke Three replied.
"Anderson, this is Tarik. Report."
[We took the moon, sir. It was ugly but we did it.]
"Casualties?"
[Eight dead, another five wounded.]
Tarik ran up his own butcher's bill. The liberation of Morristown had cost his team fifteen dead, including the three crewmen aboard Hawke One. He thought ruefully about a joke made for centuries by people who looked as though they'd had the worst end of a fight: "You should see the other guy!"
"Very well," Tarik replied, coming around a little more. "Let's get the hell out of here."
The raiding force--four operational Hammerheads leading the two remaining transports, with the fifth Hammerhead in tow behind Hawke Two--left the system. The last Jem'Hadar on the surface of Morristown saw six bright points of light in the sky suddenly vanish before he collapsed from radiaion burns.