The rebels have a surprise ready.

Angel company's landing planetside went without any mishap. In carefully rehearsed order the landing pods set down in formation on a plateau well away from any centres of habitation. The battlearmoured Angels were moving almost as soon as the pods hit the ground, within seconds they had disembarked and set up a perimeter.

Joanna turned up the zoom on her helmet mounted scope and scanned the lower ground in the direction of the largest population centre on the rebel planet. The only sign of civilisation was a metalled roadway that lay several kilometres away and was currently devoid of traffic. In the far distance, closer to the city she could see flashes and vapour trails as planetary defence weapons engaged the orbitting ships of the task ****.

"All down safe and sound." Inez's voice informed her over her comms. "Angel company's ready to move out."

Joanne switched comm channels and contacted the Persephone to relay the information. Behind her the troopers fanned out ready to march. With their battle armour they were able to keep up a steady pace of thirty kilometres an hour and could be at the cities outskirts within a few hours.

"Roger that Angel leader." Lieutenant South confirmed in response to the situation report. "We've got incoming up here, but nothing too heavy. A couple of the smaller ship's took hits and have pulled back. We have the weapon sites pinpointed now and can take them out. Looks like this one will be a pushover."

"Easy for you to say." Muttered Joanna to herself once she'd acknowledged and cut off the comm. "You're not the one who's got to go in and take on these crazies in street to street fighting."

The Angel's set off at a brisk pace, the powered suits allowing them to lope forward at relatively high speed down into the wide valley beneath the plateau. The vegetation grew thicker as they descended from the heights. It took the troopers about half an hour to reach the roadway and the plan was to follow this in towards the city, effectively cutting the rebel capital off from reinforcement. Other companies would be closing from all round the city.

Joanna paused as she reached the roadway and became aware of a tremor running through the ground beneath her feet. She did a fresh scan of the surrounding area. A couple of kilomtres beyond the roadway a camoflaged hatch was opening in the valley floor. She switched on the comm to report a possible new heavy weapons site and heard a flood of similar sightings coming from other marine units. The tremors grew more violent and the Angels crouched down to avoid falling over.

"Shit, visors up Angels." Joanna ordered as a large missile launched from the silo.

The darkened screen slid over her faceplate and shielded Joanna's eyes from the glare of the missile's jet engine. Fresh vapour trails indicated that the rebels were launching a large salvo from hidden sites all around the city.

"Angels, **** formation." Joanna barked out as she rose to her feet. "Close on the missile site by squads and clean it out."

The troopers jumped up and sped forward towards the launch area. Joanna ran at their head readying her **** rifle. They made it halfway before the missiles unexpectedly detonated in the planet's upper atmosphere instead of homing in on the fleet. An immense series of flashes lit up the sky and Joanna felt as though she'd ran head first into a wall as her suit seized. All around her the Angels were hitting the ground hard as the battlearmour locked solid in midstride. The wind was driven from Joanna's lungs as the safety kicked in and a lining of airbags inflated inside the suit. Even with this protection the Sergeant hit the ground hard, the heavy armoured suit skidding and rolling slowly to a halt.

Joanna lay dazed for a few seconds before the hiss of the airbags deflating brought her to her senses. The rebels had triggered EMP devices, the electronics in the Angels suits had been fried and the state of the art battle armour reduced to scrap metal. Joanna twisted her head inside the frozen helmet, an emergancy release mechanism was installed for just such an event. She gripped the safety tab with her teeth and pulled.