We Dare

by Chris Kennedy

  “Shit, crap, shit, f—”

  “Marty, language.” Claire was up and getting dressed; Sally walked in, sleepy-eyed. They needed to get back to the main house, but the instructions were clear, avoid open sky at all costs. It was only ten yards back to the house; they could cover it in a sprint in seconds.

  Unfortunately, Crystal Dome meant that the city was under attack by orbital weaponry—usually rocks, but also the orbital killing beam, the Totung. The Fort San Antonio perimeter presented a layered defense consisting of explosive, kinetic, and energy weapons, combined with an atmospheric “cloud” of nanoparticles designed to diffuse the energy beams. It tended to make the sky somewhat ‘energetic,’ to that point that even a few seconds exposure could be hazardous, somewhat like a full-day sunburn in seconds. Fortunately, any type of covering provided protection—including tents—as long as you stayed away from the roof and walls. The way to do this would be to make a tent, and make sure that Claire and Sally remained completely under it.

  “Claire, get the sheets and blanket off of the bed. I’m going to hold them up over us; you hold Sally and make sure you stay completely under them. “

  “Oooooooo. I’m a ghost!”

  “Yes, Sally, let’s play ghost! One big ghost, just make sure no one can see that it’s you under the blanket.” They would have to move more slowly than a sprint, but it would be under cover.

  Martin opened the door. The sky was as bright as day, with flashes of even greater brightness. He could feel a prickling sensation where his hands touched the fabric. He made sure to keep it off Claire and Sally. He’d have to check them later.

  Ten steps. Fifteen. Twenty. Should be there, but they were small steps. He stumbled on the threshold. Claire had been the one looking down; his attention was on the covering. He stumbled forward, into the door. Claire fumbled the doorknob and got the door open. There was a yell from inside the kitchen. Martin felt himself falling and pushed the other two forward, along with the blanket. His legs were still outside and exposed, he could feel the burning sensation on the back of his legs.

  He was dragged forward and the door closed, cutting off the bright sky. Sally was laughing as she crawled out from under the covers. Claire looked grim while looking down at his hands. They were red and blistered. Fortunately, on-leave didn’t mean totally off-duty. His first responder kit was in...the guest room. He could probably wait until the alert was over; there had never been an attack more than an hour or two in duration. For now, he would treat it like sunburn. This was South Texas; there would be aloe somewhere in the house. He checked Claire and Sally—no sign of redness, so they probably weren’t exposed. He’d give them both a shot of the field ‘bots they use for minor injuries. Once he could get his kit. Sally’s dose would be tricky, but it wasn’t the first time he’d treated civilians caught out in the Zone.

  * * *

  “So, you waited out an attack with your family. Was that the first time?”

  “Yes.”

  “Was anyone hurt?”

  “No.”

  “I heard you had to go outside during the Crystal Dome alert. Wasn’t that dangerous?”

  “No.”

  “Huh. Spoken like a soldier. Tell me, though, how did it make you feel, having to take your family out under the ‘Dome?”

  “I’m fine, padre. It’s what a man does. He protects his family. This is my job. I protect my family, I protect the civilians, and I fix the grunts.”

  “Ok, Marty. This is good. Well, it’s better. How’s the drinking?

  “Good.”

  “That’s not an answer, Marty.”

  “It’s under control, sir. Medical hit me with the latest ‘bot mix. I can not get drunk, so there’s no point to booze.”

  “Hmmph. Well, I suppose that’s one solution. Very well, we’ll talk to you again on Thursday.”

  * * *

  “Attention, Crystal Dome has been activated...”

  “Crap. Shit. Damn it!” Martin had come to hate the alert sound coming over the phones. Last week he’d thrown his phone against the barracks wall when it went off in the middle of the night. Unfortunately, it was one of the rough-duty military models. It just bounced.

  The attacks had gotten longer and more frequent. There was a greater probability of a leak when the rocks and beams came falling out of the sky. The HQ and Training battalions needed to keep working no matter what happened outside, so the buildings that weren’t already connected by underground tunnels, such as the SAMMC hospital complex, were now connected by tubes constructed from tent canvas. Martin heard the rapid footsteps as someone entered the building and ran toward the NCO workroom. He saved the spreadsheet he’d been working on and closed the laptop. A young soldier came running into the office, stopped at the door and saluted.

  Martin sighed, “You don’t salute me, Private.” The soldier, barely more than a boy, held the salute anyway until Martin sloppily returned it. “Okay, report.”

  “Sir! Brigade Commander! Wants you! In! His Office!” The words came out in bursts, punctuated by short gulps of breath. The kid was young, he probably had an abbreviated Basic training. Martin’s own drill sergeants would have marched, run, and drilled that out of them.

  “It’s okay, Private. Take a minute and catch your breath.” Martin stood, grabbed his cover and laptop. “Do you need to accompany me? Or are you supposed to go somewhere else?” The kid shook his head and bent over, trying to slow down his breathing. “Okay. Stay here. When you’re ready, get on over to Clinic and tell the intake nurse that Master Sergeant Martin suggests Asthma A12’bots. Come now, you can sit here in the outer office while I go see the general.”

  * * *

  The job had been hard on Wilkinson. He’d finally been promoted, but was considering stepping down for health reasons. Ironic for the commander of a Medical Brigade, but the war was wearing everyone down. As Martin came to attention and saluted, he noted the presence of another general officer in the room.

  “At ease, Marty. General Odle was informing me about the plans to pull back the Fortress perimeter.” Wilkinson sat, but did not invite Martin to do so. “I will be brief. We need to evacuate Bullis. Training Company needs to get in under the umbrella as we pull it back. The Crystal Dome perimeter is being contracted to inside the Loop. Their first sergeant was injured in the last attack. You may be surprised to hear that Captain Wohlrab requested you as Top—strictly on a temporary basis. Get out to Bullis, get the company moved down here, then you’ll be back to your regular duties.”

  “Yes, sir. Will do, sir.” Martin paused a moment. “Sir, may I ask a question?”

  “Go ahead, Marty.”

  “If we’re contracting the perimeter, what about civilians outside the Loop?”

  Wilkinson ignored the question and gave the other officer a meaningful look. Odle cleared his throat. Martin had the feeling he had met him before, perhaps as a more junior officer in the Litterbox. “We don’t have enough coverage. Dependents are welcome in the refugee centers. Other civilians we will accommodate as space allows. We may be down to tents on the fairgrounds. The perimeter is not absolute, those close in will still be protected; we just can’t guarantee 100% coverage.”

  “Understood, Sir.”

  “Marty, I know your family is outside the Loop, but they’re so close, it should be okay. If it’s any consolation, our families are there, too.”

  “Yes, sir, understood. Claire mentioned seeing Mrs. Wilkinson at the market.”

  “Good, then. Get out to Bullis and get our boys pulled in. Dismissed.”

  * * *

  “Go, go. Go! In the trucks! Now!” The latest alert had sounded 40 minutes ago. Most attacks these days ran for hours, and the longer it went, the weaker the fringes of the ‘Dome. There was no chance of avoiding open sky. There was already evidence of lightning-like strikes just to the north, well within the perimeter of the training encampment.

  It was 25 miles back to the SAMMC by road. Only 15 miles by dire
ct line, but it wouldn’t be enough. Crystal Dome was being contracted back to a 10 mile radius from the center of town. It would cover the core of the city and the Joint Base, but portions of Randolph and Medina Air Force Bases were outside the perimeter, not to mention all of Camp Bullis. The latest word from brigade was that the defense system was being overtaxed to maintain the existing umbrella long enough to evacuate those areas.

  An extremely bright flash of light overhead was followed by a seeming shadow. Martin was the only person in the open by that point, trusting on his nanobots to fix any flash damage he might sustain. It was reckless, but he was damned if he would don one of the hot, heavy radiation suits. He looked up. No shadow, just a lack of energy discharges overhead.

  No discharges.

  He scanned what he could see of the horizon. No bright shield, but plenty of bright beams of light.

  That meant...

  “Trucks move out now! If you’re not in a truck, get back to the bunkers! Now! Now! Now! Crystal Dome is down, people!”

  * * *

  “This guy again! Vinnie, what does it take to keep him from running into trouble? Why is he back on my table?”

  “Brigade says he saved a lot of guys.”

  “Harrumph. Damned cowboys. Full of shrapnel. Again, Vinnie.”

  “A lot of guys.”

  “Okay, opening up...”

  * * *

  “Talk to me, Marty.”

  “Talk to me! Marty! Snap out of it soldier!”

  “They’re...they’re gone, Padre!” Martin was sobbing, covering his face with his right hand.

  “Your family? We don’t know that.”

  “It’s a fucking crater! They’re gone...my family, the Training Company, half of the brigade. All the trainees are gone.”

  “You saved a lot of people, Marty!”

  “Not enough. I failed them, Padre! I failed my family and all of the troops under my care. I’m still here. Why am I still here, Padre?”

  “You died, Marty. You saved the captain. Again, I might add, and he knows it! You saved the five truckloads of trainees that were loaded before the ‘Dome went down. You walked back to the perimeter with a soldier over your shoulder. Your one good shoulder, I might add.”

  “Fuck that. I’ve died seven fucking times! They brought me back every fucking time. ‘You were only mostly dead, Marty!’ ‘We can rebuild you, Marty!’ ‘You’re lucky, Marty!’ Heart stopped? Electric shock will restart it. Bleeding out? We’ve got volume expanders, quick-clot, and nanobots. Lost an arm? No problem, we’ve been doing limb transplants for years!”

  “You do realize I know about that last one, right?” The chaplain held up his right hand. The fingers were stiff, and the skin color changed abruptly below the wrist. “Works okay, I guess, but the fingertips are still numb. And by the way, it’s six times, Marty.”

  “Seven, Padre. Everyone forgets the first time, in the fucking ‘Stans. The ‘Litterbox.’ Hell yeah—applies to everywhere, now. Rocks, gravel, sand, litter, buried shit, and stinks all to hell.” Marty gulped, rubbed his face again, and peered, red-eyed, at the chaplain. “Seven times, Padre. Once more and I’m an honorary cat! Fucking nine lives. What the hell do I care if my fingertips are numb? God knows I’m all numb, Padre!”

  “Yes, my son. God knows. God knows you are hurting. God also knows about all of the lives you’ve saved. Perhaps you need to think about them, too. Remember the good times, and hold on to them. Honor their sacrifices by doing the best you can. You’ve shown so much courage. Be courageous, Marty.”

  “I’ve just been doing my job, Padre. It’s the only thing I have left. The only thing I know how to do.”

  “I know, Marty. Pray with me.”

  * * *

  The beeping slowed down. The instruments settled back to a normal rhythm. “And...done! Close him up, Anthony. How are his vitals, Vinnie?”

  “BP is rising, heart rate slow, but steady. Respiration’s still low, but Oh-two sats are good.”

  “That last spike had me worried, Vinnie.”

  “He was in pretty active REM sleep at the time. The chill slowed everything else down, but didn’t seem to keep him from dreaming.”

  “I hope they were pleasant dreams, Vinnie. Good work, Anthony, keep those stitches tight. Number eight, huh? How does this guy do it?”

  “You didn’t see the Medal?”

  “Medal? What do you mean?”

  “The Medal, Mark. Some general came in and pinned it to the pillow when he was being prepped. Told us to keep it with him at all times.”

  “So that explains why the field generator was glitching. I’m surprised you allowed metal into the sterile field, Vinnie!”

  “It’s...the Medal, Mark. This guy’s a real bonafide hero.”

  “Hah! Heroes are only Regular Joes in the wrong place at the wrong time, and no way out of the fire but straight up the middle.”

  “This guy died eight times and was brought back each time. I think that qualifies, Mark. That Medal shows that he ran toward the fire...and he brought a lot of other Regular Joes out with him.”

  “Understood, but I’m not sure that makes him brave or a fool rushing in where angels fear to tread.”

  * * * * *

  Robert E. Hampson Bio

  Dr. Robert E. Hampson wants your brain! Don’t worry, he’s not a zombie. He’s a neuroscientist who is working on the first “neural prosthetic” to restore human memory using the brain’s own neural codes. As a nonfiction writer and consultant, he uses his PhD to blog about brain science and to advise over a dozen science fiction writers. As an SF writer himself, he puts the science in hard-science & military SF, and looks for the SF influences in science. While not a zombie, he does know a few things about them, and will keep them away from your brain…at least until he can use it for his own nefarious purposes! He is a popular convention panelist who makes science—and science fiction—interesting and accessible to the public. Find out more at his website: http://REHampson.com.

  Author Note:

  A substantially shorter version of this story appeared in U.S. Army Small Wars Journal as “Where Angels Fear,” a finalist in the U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command Mad Scientist Initiative 2017.

  # # # # #

  To Dust by Marisa Wolf

  Part 1

  The largest explosion she had ever caused ripped through the outpost with a voracity normally reserved for half-starved predators.

  She didn’t know how many she’d just taken out between the primary blast and the meticulously staggered secondaries. She’d stopped counting kills some half-dozen bombings ago.

  Not counting didn’t help any more than counting had, but it was always nice to make a choice.

  Eight Months Ago

  Devra pressed each finger to its respective thumb by turn, the deliberate pressure of the repetitive gestures managing to partially block out Shike getting to know the newbie. The fifth time through her cycle, her left hand knocked the biofeedback out of balance, and half the nerves in that arm sent up a fiery protest.

  “What’s your damage?” Shike asked casually—and too close to kindness—for her to want to hear.

  Devra knew it wasn’t the newbie’s fault, being dropped off when she should have been picked up, tromping in from Command with his fresh orders and confused eyes. By the time he’d been down and processed, she could do nothing but imagine the arc of the dropship’s departure, curving around this shithole of a planet to meet its jumpship, which in turn would slingshot its way out of this ass-end of a system off to some other hotspot.

  She should have been well out of the system by now, deep into the wormhole express, safe to sleep until home. Instead, she had to lie on her too-thin bunk in the too-empty barracks she’d lived in for far too long and listen to yet another fresh recruit stumble his way through his mods.

  “My damage? Oh, I got, uh, eyes.” The slang threw him; must be the recruits called mods some other dismissive term now. Or he was just eas
ily thrown, finding himself on the ground of storied Huvo with a handful of soldiers scattered around him.

  Devra squeezed three fingers on her right hand against their thumb, a failed attempt to block out the sound of his uncontrolled blinking.

  “We all got eyes, Junior.” Shike laughed amiably, letting the newbie laugh with him.

  “To see above our spectrum. You know, uh, infrared. A little ultraviolet.”

  “Be better if you got ears. We could use a little more radar. Ours is buggy.” Gibbon pitched in from the other side of the barracks, trying to lure Devra into the conversation.

  “Ours is supposed to be halfway to the gas giant by now, G. A little respect.” Shike took his reputation as the peacekeeper of their team seriously, but Devra still could have kicked him with real joy in her heart. “That it, Rook? Dialed up your eyes, and they dropped you off into the longest-slog colonial shit storm we got?”

  “My bones are—”

  “All our bones are reinforced, Newbie. They don’t make a solider soldier than a Huvo soldier.” Turk this time, chiming in from the farthest end of the barracks, where he filled the doorway with his near-infinite sets of pull-ups.

  “Oh.” The kid stopped blinking to swallow a few dozen times. Devra seriously considered burning the barracks down to get some quiet, but it wasn’t to be. The dry clay of this corner of Huvo wouldn’t burn anyhow. “They made me a runner.”

  “Told you we were getting more twos.” Shike leaned over to slap the newbie on the shoulder. “Nice, Junior. You get speed, distance, jumps, what?”

  “Speed and jumps. I’m not all distance, but enough.” For the first time, a hint of pride edged through the kid’s nervousness.