"Numbers, click off."
He slowly replaced the microphone, and slid the binoculars up to his eyes with patient grace.
The radio began to sound with successively longer groups of clicks. One, pause, two clicks, pause, three, and so on until all the rangers in the valley had signed in, indicating their health and readiness.
"Copy." Mathias finished. Takanome's Rangers were... unconventional. But they were all most refugees had.
He scanned the horizon again, noting no disturbance. It could be a good day. A refugee group was on route to the city, and the Rangers were here to make sure they made it. They weren't always needed. And besides, this was a new route.
Mathias hoped they would not be needed today.
He did a visual check on the Rangers, sweeping his binoculars slowly over each position in turn.
In truth, there was nothing to see. Which was exactly what he was hoping for. Takanome's Rangers had few advantages in the field, but skill with camouflage was one of them. All good.
There was silence and stillness for two hours.
"Four, package inbound." fizzled calmly over the radio. Mathias swung his binoculars over to sniper four with the calm precision expected of one of Takanome's finest. He then began searching for the contact Four had called in.
"Six, confirm." Came whispered over the radio. Mathias gazed into the gap in the foliage between the two snipers, and saw the first hint of refugees.
Before long the column was clearly visible. A few hundred exhausted, ragged survivors marching, defeated, to the Last City. Mathias wondered how long they had been travelling. How far they had come.
They were almost done, at least.
Suddenly the ground beneath him grew a familiar gentle quiver, and his heart sank.
He clenched his fist around the binoculars and hoped it was geological. He held his breath, and scanned the sky. His hope died when the radio spoke.
"Three, dropship. South south east." Sniper three calmly informed the rest of the group.
Mathias swore silently. His binoculars focused on the ship settling down a few dozen feet above the ridge on the southern side. Small drop arms extended from the hatches on the underbelly, and Fallen started pouring out. Four, eight, ten, a dozen. Eighteen, Mathias counted.
He swore silently again before picking up his microphone.
"This is Eight. I count eighteen tangos, confirm." He hoped he had miscounted.
"Three, confirm eighteen tangos."
Damn.
Some members of the convoy had already seen the dropship and panic was setting in. The refugees were starting to scatter. Mathias radioed on an open channel down to the convoy, relaying the number of Fallen and the number of Rangers. The leader of the convoy, between shouting at his refugees, responded with little faith. But he got his people organized, and got them moving.
This was enough for Mathias.
The fallen were starting to work their way down the mountainside. They were a few hundred feet from the refugees, and Mathias realized something. They had deployed behind. They didn't want to cut off the refugees. That wasn't enough.
They wanted to hunt them.
Mathias' blood burned as he called out to his rangers.
"One through seven, weapons free. Stagger shots. Don't give away your positions without a fight. Make your bullets count."
The radio crackled to life as each ranger in turn clicked that they copied his transmission.
Mathias glared into his binoculars at the alien menace of the Fallen, and hoped that the Rangers would be enough.
The first Dreg was almost within weapons range of the back of the stampeding convoy when the valley echoed with it's first thunder clap. In an instant the creature's head was gone, a crackling black mist in it's place.
It's rabid brethren at first didn't seem to notice, but as the valley began to pop with gunshot after gunshot (staggered carefully after weeks of training) and Fallen Dregs two and three collapsed, they scattered.
The creatures began moving erratically, searching for the sources of the gunfire. But still moving ever closer to the convoy. The success that had seconds ago flushed Mathias with pride was quickly evaporating.
Any bullet that didn't find it's way to a Fallen mask seemed almost not to matter. Dregs were taking round after round to their hate-filled alien chests before they dropped to the earth, hopefully for the last time. Always searching for the source of their attackers. Always making their way towards the convoy.
The refugees were in a full sprint now, but somehow it didn't seem to matter. Even suppressed by the fire of the Rangers, the Fallen were too fast. Too strong.
Mathias watched helplessly through his binoculars as the first Dreg made it to the last refugee.
An arc knife, a scream silenced by distance and gunfire, and the Dreg was ready for it's next victim.
Or it would have been, but it's head erupted in a geyser of oily blood. But it's place was taken in an instant by another Fallen. And another behind. And another behind it. All staring at a particular space in the brush as they ducked and weaved.
It was then that Mathias realized they had found one of his snipers.
"Three, you're under suspicion." He called into his microphone.
"Copy." Came the terse reply.
Mathias watched angrily as Sniper Three's position lit up with crack after crack of sniper fire. The closest Dreg dropped to the ground, dead, and the second stumbled with the impact. But now they were sure.
One of them screamed something in their infernal language, and gesticulated wildly in the air. It pointed at Sniper Three and the rest of them began to charge.
"You're blown Three." Mathias calmly whispered into the radio, following procedure.
"Copy." Sniper three responded mid-gunshot. Her position became a staccato rhythm of gunfire, four shots in a row followed by a silence. And then another four.
The Fallen had all but abandoned the convoy at this point, and the humans were making considerable ground. All the Fallen seemed to care about was Sniper Three. The rest of the Rangers were using the distraction to focus their fire. Maintaining procedure, firing and then waiting. Staying invisible. Staying safe.
"Three it's time to give it up. Get out of there." Mathias ordered over the radio, his voice growling with authority.
"Copy."
The hundred feet in front of Sniper Three's position was littered with Fallen corpses. Five of them had met their end at the wrong end of her, and her companion's, rifles. Mathias quickly scanned the battlefield. Four more had been felled before reaching Three's area of devastation. Nine of the Fallen remained, two of them Vandals.
"Three I order you to disappear." He practically shouted into his microphone. He checked, the Fallen were still well within range to chase down the refugees, but they were focused on Sniper Three.
"Copy."
Three's position continued to roar with gunfire. Two more Dregs fell before her.
The Vandals, four armed savage monstrosities with incredible rifles and a burning hatred for humanity that dwarfed the Dreg's, were directing their remaining troops around to pincer Three. The jig was up.
"Three you have done your job now move out." It was a lie, as soon as the Fallen realized she was gone they would chase down the refugees. They would be out of most of the Ranger's line of fire. Most would make it. Some would not. By the time they repositioned, the loss would be devastating. But it was a lie that could save a Ranger's life, and Rangers were in short supply.
"Copy." Four more shots rang out, doing little but aggravating the nearest Vandal.
"Three you are going to get yourself killed."
"Copy." Came the emotionless response, in time with the click of a reload.
"Three..." But it was far past too late. The creatures fell upon her position with interstellar fury. Mathias found no reprimand on his tongue. "...Ayane would be proud."
"Copy." sparked the radio, in the half-second before Sniper Three's grenades all went off. Her position was erased, replaced with a thirty foot wide golden fireball consuming all the remaining Fallen. The valley was bathed in a warm red glow for an instant, fading into an orange light that followed the cloud of gas up into the sky before dissipating.
Mathias' eyes burned from the brightness, he told himself. His binoculars calmly, coolly surveyed the battlefield, counting bodies and confirming kills.
Eighteen, at his count.
"Eighteen kills, please confirm."
"This is Four, confirm eighteen kills."
There was silence for a time.
Finally Specialist Mathias Alonso rose from his position, and collected his things. When he was finished, he raised his radio to his lips one last time.
"Sniper Three, Seong Choi. Gave her last full measure in the Valley of the Moon."
As he began the long walk back to the city, the clicks of Takanome's Rangers called out their respect in ascending order.
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