Starship Troopers: Chronicles of a Mobile Infanterist

Chapter 6

"You cannot fight a war semi-good. Either you win it or you lose it. And we are losing big time."
- Colonel Juan Rico, two days after the disaster over Hydora

"Nothing killed more in history than ignorance. In this case it wasn't a groups ignorance but the one of a single man which lead to hundreds of thousands of casualties."
- Rear Admiral Carmencita Ibanez, five days after the fiasco at Hydora

There was a lot more that happened after Hydora. Following the restructuring of the frontier command, Captain Ibanez was promoted to Rear Admiral and was put in command of the first assault fleet. So, while our ship was being repaired an we were still drowning ourselves in sorrow, we suddenly became the core of a new taskforce, tasked with bug-hunting.
The plan was simple:
The Mobile Infantry goes down to the surface, kills the Plasma-bugs, and gets the bugs' attention, and then retreats while the fleet turns the entire planet into nuclear slag. Not the most efficient, but concerning the circumstances, it was the best option we had. And just imagine, I had to deal with personal problems myself when I found out my dad was coming to the MI and, to my big surprise, to our unit. Seeing him again wasn't as tough as I had imagined. I insisted on picking him up. When the transport with the newbies had just arrived and freshmeat infanterists were rushing out of the transport, I was strained looking for my old man. And then, I saw him. I gathered all my composure and called into the room:
"Victorio Vasquez? Is there a Private Victorio Vazquez in here?"
"Yes! Yes that would be me!" he called and rushed over to me. I greeted him and accompanied him to our barracks. Just as we were passing B-Companies quarters he asked me:
"Pardon me Maam, but I don't reckon you telling me your name. Might I ask what it is?"
"Yes you might.", my heart was beating like crazy," I'm seargent first class, Henri Vasquez."
His mouth seemingly didn't want to close and small tears trickled down both our cheeks.
"Hey, Papa." i said to him.
"Niña!" he answered and then just hugged me.
While we went on walking he told me the reason, why he joined the MI. Apparently my mother was sleeping with another guy, which came out when I was reported KIA. My dad divorced her and then sold the company and put all the money he had gained from selling the company onto a different account. As a backup. I introduced my father to the rest of the team. To Chesa, Crimson, Bercow and all the others who were the OG's. He adjusted to the life rather quickly while we headed out to carry out our "Scorched Earth" tactics. Everything went exactly as it was planned. We were dropped to stir them up a little bit and drive them out of their holes, were then exfiltrated and watched while fleet turned the planet to slag until nothing, and I mean NOTHING, was able to live anymore. If, and only IF something was left alive the usage of Q-bombs was authorized. This was the case on dozens of planets. On PDC-8864, PDC-0846, PDC-1189, PEC-9981, PDC-1111 and on so many more( PDC: Planet with desertlike Conditions; PEC: Planet with earthlike conditions). We had the Q-bombs for a different purpose. For killing the Titan, but luckily the usage was authorized for other occasions. So, while we destroyed bug-planet after bug-planet something was happening back home on earth. As we later heard, Fleetcom and the "Skinnies" had some success in locating the Titan. It was a danger to them as well as it was to us. They were able to narrow it down to about a sector. It still was more then twenty star systems, too many for our scattered fleet. So the "Skinnies" offered their help and sent a fleet of two-hundred capital ships to the region. We scattered around the sector in smaller battlegroups and searched and searched until a Corvette of the "Skinnies" found the Titan over the fourth moon of the second planet of the Benrich-398 system. A planet with very little vegetation but a very breathable atmosphere. High Commands orders were to hold back while they gathered the necessary war-supplies and reinforcement troops for us. For them it was an all-or-nothing scenario. The federation alone gathered 1100 warships and more then 700.000 Mobile Infanterists and 3 Million AtR soldiers. The "Skinnies" sent out ninehundred warships and almost 2 Million of their own soldiers. It would be the battle of our lives. I can barely tell, how afraid we were. We knew it was serious when Chesa received a carton with four hundred Micronuclear-igniters, all with federation sigils. And then it started. The horns blew and we got the order.

Now it started, and we knew, that if we didn't succeed, humanity was doomed.

"So,", we said over and over again," If we die, then at least we will die together."

And people would die.