Fort Howe

"This is an order, Laird." Augustus pointed to the exit of A-220 Commercial Street. "Head that way. Move out."

"Yes, sir." Laird gave a model salute, then turned and ran toward the exit.

Augustus watched Laird pass several squads. Amid their startled looks and shouts, the Marine—reformed into a re-socialized soldier after being convicted of murder—strode steadily through the exit.

"Get ready, Rick."

"Understood, Mengsk. I'll stake my sniper's badge on it—I won't miss."

Rick Kidd tightened his grip on his sniper rifle. The computer built into his armor was calculating the temperature, humidity, altitude, and air pressure on the display in his visor, and could also help him correct for elevation and windage. In the time it took his heart to beat once, Rick pulled the trigger for the first shot. The sounds of the outside world seemed to fade away, everything cut off from him.

Now he had to watch for the brief flash of a sniper rifle firing from the high-rise across the way, then catch the sniper and kill him before he could retreat and find a new firing position.

As Rick focused every ounce of his concentration on the crosshairs, a faint golden glimmer appeared in his wide-open eyes, though he couldn't notice it. This was one sign of a psionic using his powers. More powerful human psionics could make their eyes glow like molten gold when they used their abilities.

At that moment, the rain began to fall more slowly.

In Rick's world, time itself slowed, as though he were inside a space where time moved at a crawl, overlapping with the real world.

This made it easier for Rick to seize the perfect moment to snipe. With the slightest twitch of his finger, he could blow the top off any target's skull. So far, Rick had never missed unless some irresistible outside force interrupted him.

For an instant, Rick caught a fleeting flash from an electronic tower across the way. In less than a breath, he had locked onto his target. Then, just as the sniper in a hooded gray robe began to pull away, the heavy jolt of the rifle stock against his shoulder armor brought time back to normal.

A sense of satisfaction and accomplishment welled up in Rick—something he had never felt during the eighteen years he'd spent growing up as the Bennett Family's Heir. The thrill of sniping fascinated him, gradually turning him into a skilled and ruthless killer.

Rick had accepted his new role and was content with it.

"I got him. I'll keep watch on that spot while you cross the square." Rick quickly moved from his position.

"Good," Augustus replied over the comms.

When Rick set up his sniper rifle on another floor, he saw a force in silver-gray Power Armor running through the central square in his scope. He watched the last of them pass through the square's exit and enter the more open Highway 40.

Suddenly, Rick began to wonder how Augustus had made that sniper fire so decisively. But he soon put the question out of his mind. As far as Rick was concerned, there was nothing Augustus couldn't do.

Once Augustus's unit reached Highway 40, they gradually joined up with 5th Battalion and companies from other battalions. Along the highway, the Confederacy forces encountered only a small number of Kel-Morian troops and a few tanks.

The Kel-Morian tanks were less like tanks than heavy tracked armored vehicles converted from mining tractors. Plasteel plates had been welded onto them, and sharp spikes covered their side armor and the plates in front of their tracks. Their turrets came in all shapes and sizes, with guns of varying calibers.

Some Kel-Morian tanks even had a main gun mounted both front and rear, though their turrets couldn't turn.

The tractor engines needed an external water tank for cooling. As the engines roared like a Giant, steam rose in bursts from the tanks' hoods.

The Kel-Morian tanks also fought in a wild, reckless style. Their crazed drivers preferred to charge at the Confederacy Marines and run them over, even when they still had plenty of ammunition left.

But a handful of tanks couldn't break the Confederacy forces. They were quickly destroyed by the Confederacy's anti-tank weapons. The road to the city center was now clear, and Augustus's unit followed the other companies west.

Meanwhile, Confederacy forces attacking from other directions had already entered the city. The Kel-Morians' fortresses and defensive positions around their command center, satellite communications station, and heavy industry plants fell one after another.

The fleet battle in Turaxis II's geosynchronous orbit was also drawing to a close. Under the assault of the enormous fleets formed by nearly ten Leviathan- and Behemoth-class battlecruisers from Alpha and Delta Squadron, along with their assault ships and escorts, the Kel-Morians' last three battlecruisers warped away from orbit.

In the depths of space, the wreckage of warships fell into eternal silence once the last of the oxygen inside them had burned away. Thousands upon thousands of shattered pieces of metal circled the planet, each crushed and melted compartment and deck a cold tomb for dozens or even hundreds of souls.

With no fleet or air support, and several armies closest to Pride of Boke already fighting the Confederacy forces, even the most hardline war overseers in the Kel-Morian command center had accepted that defeat was inevitable by 2:00 p.m.

By the time Augustus's squad reached the city center, the few remaining Kel-Morian forces had begun surrendering to the Confederacy troops on their commanders' orders.

At 5:00 p.m., the Confederacy forces crushed the last Kel-Morian unit still resisting.

The 5th Battalion of the 4th Brigade assembled on a landing pad at the Kel-Morian command center. Augustus, Raynor, and the others, all looking glum, sat on the pad and waited for the transport.

At 7:00 p.m., a heavy APOD transport carried Augustus's squad back across the Paddick River to the 5th Battalion's base. As soon as they disembarked, a master sergeant at the camp called to tell Augustus that Omo's condition had remained critical since he was taken to the Marine hospital at Pride of Boke.

Augustus immediately boarded a supply truck with Raynor, heading from the 5th Battalion's base to the hospital. Unusually exhausted, he rode in silence. Raynor's grief and pain were even more apparent than Augustus's. He didn't even know how to break the news to his own family and Omo's parents.

Even if Omo survived, he would probably need artificial organs and mechanical limbs to live a normal life.

And, more realistically, they were only going to see Omo one last time.

Before entering the hospital, Augustus and Raynor had steeled themselves, determined not to let their own distress affect Omo. But when a nurse wheeled Omo's body past them on a flatbed trolley, neither of them could hold back their tears.

A week later, the ashes of Benjamin and Omo were returned to their hometown for burial. The 5th Battalion of the 4th Brigade was transferred away from Pride of Boke. Augustus's squad traveled with the company by train to Fort Howe, a thousand miles away. They arrived that evening and were stationed at the fort to ease the ever-growing strain on its garrison, which was facing the increasingly active Kel-Morian Haigolong Legion nearby.