Mace stared at the bleak durasteel of the blast door while the trooper captain filled him in.

The blast door was a full meter thick, and locked with internal bolts of neutronium. Its surface was smooth. Dull matte gray. From the outside, it was controlled by a code panel. The inside had a manual wheel. When the wheel was engaged, the code panel was useless.

The command bunker was more secure than most treasure vaults. Only the swiftness of their assault had allowed Mace, Depa, and the Akk Guards to capture it in the first place; the defenders had not had time to swing it shut.

The brightly lit corridor seemed unreal. A full platoon of heavy assault troopers crouched in a tight are on the white tile around the blast door, bolting tripods into the floor and charging weapons. Four more platoons waited in reserve, two down either direction of the corridor. Mace stood in front of the door. Geptun sat on a heavy repeater’s fusion pack, white-knuckled hands clutching his armored datapad. Nick sat on the floor with his back against the wall beside the door, eyes closed. He might have been asleep.

[...]

He turned again to CC-8/349. “I will go in first. Your men will enter on my command. Two platoons. Come in shooting: blast anything that moves. But this is not search and destroy. You’re there solely to cover Colonel Geptun. You will take all available measures to protect him, and to ensure that he completes his mission. His mission is the objective of this operation, understood? If he fails, nothing else matters.”

“Yes, sir. Understood, sir.”

“The rest of you will remain out here to hold the doorway. If you have to. And if you can.”

“Um, if I might interrupt—?” Geptun coughed delicately. “Has anyone considered just how we are going to get in?”

“Just like we do everything else,” Nick said. “The hard way.”

“Pardon?”

“Shaped charges,” Mace told him. He turned to the trooper captain. “Proton grenades. Blow the door.”

“General—!” CC-8/349 stiffened to attention. “With the general’s pardon, sir, Commander Seven-One’s still in there! With more than twenty men. And there are prisoners to consider, sir. Including civilians. If we use proton grenades, the casualties—”

“There is no one in that room except the dead,” Mace said heavily. “And the people who killed them.”

He nodded to Nick. “Cover my back from the doorway.” The young Korun drew Chalk’s pistol from his left holster. He held both guns low and loose, and nodded back.

[...]

“People,” Mace said with tragic conviction, “change.”

He ignited his blade. He held it with both hands.

“May the Force be with us.”

He looked at CC-8/349.

“All right, Captain. Blow the door.”

[...]

Greasy smoke curled from the shattered blast door. It reeked of blood and flesh and human waste.

The smell of death.

Mace stood next to the door, waiting for the smoke to thin.

The command bunker was dark as a cave. The only light was the white shaft that spilled in through the opening that used to be the door. The interior materialized as though it slowly drew substance from the haze itself.

Bodies were everywhere.

Piled along the walls. Draped over the banks of monitor consoles. Facedown on the floor in black pools.

Some wore combat armor. Some wore militia khakis. Some wore no uniform at all.

Some were missing pieces.

Mace’s blade hissed in the smoke as he went inside.


- Shatterpoint, Chapters 22-23