Hard Drop

by Will van Der Vaart

  “And if I decided to shoot in there - ?” Tyco nodded towards MAP-11 and the facility.

  “I would have killed you where you stood.” She answered sweetly, moving quickly past the checkpoint and heading up the slope towards them, leaving Shelley’s corpse behind.

  “Oh, hell no - !” Hog muttered, staring at Flip with both admiration and disgust. “You were going to play us like that?!”

  Flip opened her mouth to respond, but a guttural growl from MAP-11 interrupted her, shaking through the creature and across the asphalt below her. He had seen Shelley lying in the dirt, the puddle of blood around his head. He turned, spinning, sweeping his gun in a vicious arc as Flip came alongside him. It caught her arm and sent her sprawling, flying up the hillside and landing with a hard thud.

  The microchip flew from her hand and slid along the concrete ramp. Flip scrambled after it, hearing the grinding concrete as MAP-11 wheeled around behind her, groaning as he leveled his gun and flicked his safety, his armored finger coiling around the trigger.

  Her fingers curled around the chip. She smashed the bright red control button desperately, over and over. Her whole body tensed as she imagined the fingers curling on the triggers, the bullets flying towards her, the soft, scything impact as they cut through the thin armor around her neck and plunged through her skin, turning out the lights with brutal finality.

  But they didn’t come.

  Hardly daring to believe her luck, she rose and turned slowly to face the creature, willing herself to look him square in the face.

  The chip had done its job. The living, breathing colossus towered over her, frozen in place, armor locked, his finger still gripping the trigger.

  Flip sighed in weary relief. She turned back to pick up the pistol from the hard concrete, and stopped short. She found herself staring into the bloodshot eyes of a kneeling, snarling rebel, almost feral in his fury.

  “Fuck.” She muttered, under her breath, considering the horrible distance between the pistol and her free hand, calculating how quickly she would have to move. The odds weren’t in her favor.

  The soldier moved first, feet flying as they scraped against the ground, trying to push himself to full height. His head lifted jerkily, rising just above hers –

  And exploded in a fine red mist. He was rocked backwards by the force, instantly dead, slamming back against the ground. Flip glanced backwards immediately, looking up and straight into MAP-11’s smoking gun barrel. The distance between her head and the rebel’s had been minute; the bullet had passed within fractions of an inch of her skull. For an instant, she considered that the chip hadn’t worked; that MAP-11 had aimed for her, and missed.

  But the creature was far from hostile in his movements. He bent low and offered her his free hand, letting his rifle trail away. She hesitated before taking it, scrutinizing him for any sign of his attention. Her side throbbed where she had fallen on the pavement, and she was reluctant to repeat the experience. She took the creature’s hand, at last, and let him pull her roughly to her feet.

  “What the hell was that?” Hog called nervously, coming down towards her at a trot. “Why’d he stop like that?”

  “We thought you were dead.” Chip joined in, though it wasn’t clear from his expression that that would not have been a good thing.

  “Behavioral modification trigger.” She said, holding up the microchip. “Works like a shock collar.” She explained, “I saw him use it earlier in the lab.”

  “Can we get one for Chip?” Hog asked gruffly. Flip smiled

  “Ha fucking ha.” He said in return, the smirk on his face twisting his lips into a scowl.

  The growls of rebels around them brought them back to their senses. Already, they had risen to their feet on the plateau below, standing as a mass of angry flesh. Shelley’s body lay obscured from view beneath the throng of bodies. The spell was broken, this time beyond repair.

  “Time to go!” Tyco shouted from above, and all hell broke loose below. The rebels swarmed in from all angles. The team rushed together, dodging gunfire from above as well as below. Tyco took one glance up the hillside and knew the stranded truck was a lost cause. He turned instead for the checkpoint below and the cover of its concrete barriers. “Guardhouse.” He tapped in, clipped and terse, as he sprinted towards it. The team broke with him at once.

  MAP-11 was a flurry of movement in the crowd of rebels, wheeling ferociously as the soldiers moved in. He swung his rifle arm like a club, smashing an assailant across the jaw and dropping him in a limp heap. He fired quick, clipped bursts, dropping first one, then another soldier, and grasped a third by the neck with his free hand, flinging him into the crowd, and sending a handful of soldiers tumbling backwards.

  Flip kept pace below him, working her machine gun at nearly point-blank range, firing and firing and firing, trying not to overheat her barrel, wishing to god she could use her rocket launcher but knowing it would be suicide at this distance. It was all she could do to stay out of MAP-11’s way, so unrelenting and energetic were his movements. The brunt of the rebels’ onslaught came from behind them, from the facility’s gates, and they edged their way backwards, away from it, cutting a path through the thinner crowd ahead towards the guardhouse.

  Tyco and Chip reached the heavy concrete barriers just in time, dropping down behind them as the bullets whistled past. They slammed into the thick concrete, chipping away at the barriers and sending up clouds of fine grey dust.

  The mountain shook again, the hard stone trembling underfoot as a massive detonation rocked through it. A bright light flashed in the sky, and Tyco ducked, covering his eyes and holding his fire. Hog was caught out in the open, blinded and stopped in her tracks. She stared transfixed as the mushroom cloud yawned skywards below. There was a hideous, undeniable beauty to it, and it had caught her at the worst possible moment.

  “Hog!” Tyco shouted at the top of his lungs, peering out at her from behind his cover. She was close, only a dozen yards from the checkpoint and temporary safety, almost close enough to touch. She looked down and saw him, realizing the awful danger of her situation. She turned to follow, grinding her boots against the rubble, lunging forwards to pick up her run even as Tyco rose to cover her.

  The bullet whistled as it came, zipping low over the pavement until it smashed into her back leg with a horrible thud. She went down hard, knocked flat on her back as her feet were swept from under her. She gasped in pain as she landed, winded by the sudden, unexpected impact of her fall. Gritting her teeth, she rolled on her side, trying to raise herself up on her good leg. The guardhouse was close, close enough to where she might still make it. She looked up and saw Tyco fire until his magazine went empty, saw Chip standing as well, rattling off shot after shot, their faces tense and begging for her to get up.

  She raised herself on one knee and crawled for all that she was worth, lunging forwards and clawing desperately for purchase against the hard concrete, trying to ignore the shooting pain in her leg.

  She had gone ten hard-earned, painful feet, half the distance to the checkpoint, when the rebels found her range again. A flood of bullets washed over her, smashing into her stomach, shoulder, and neck with sudden brutality.

  Hog was flung bodily backwards, her shoulders pinned to the ground, lying there limply in a daze. Her world was spinning, the concrete rolling and falling away below her, then screaming back upward with dizzying speed. She felt sick to her stomach, willing it to stop and knowing it wouldn’t. It was all she could do to hang on.

  A furious barrage broke out from the guardhouse, and then Tyco was kneeling over her, staying low to the ground, his face only inches from hers.

  “I’m sorry, Cap.” She said, simply, and felt the tears rise to her eyes.

  Tyco tried to smile, but the anguish he felt drowned out everything else. “Try to dodge next time.” He said, huskily, his voice heavy with emotion.

  “Yes, sir.” She nodded painfully. She reached for her tags and tore them off, wincing with pa
in as the chain broke around her neck, tangling with her rosary. He took them from her, letting his hand close around hers tenderly.

  “I’m glad it was you, Cap.” She said, and sighed, her voice falling to a whisper. “I’m glad you made the call. I would have killed him.”

  “He isn’t worth it.” Tyco answered bitterly. “None of it is. I should have gotten us out when I had the chance.”

  “He’s the best thing we’ve died for yet.” Hog smiled thinly, doing the best she could to ease Tyco’s burden.

  He nodded slowly, staring back at her, trying to form the words to say what he meant.

  “Take care of Chip, will you?” Hog said. “I never liked him, but, you know…”

  “I wish it were him.” Tyco said, at last, gasping the words as they tore through him. “I wish it were anyone but you.”

  “I know, Cap.” She said, and squeezed his hand. “I know.”

  She reached up to him, then, putting her hand to his chin, and kissed his cheek with simple, unpracticed battlefield elegance, graceful and feminine despite all that had gone before. “Now,” She said, pulling away, her tone shifting abruptly back to business. “Give me my gun.”

  Tyco pulled it roughly from the rubble that covered it and placed it firmly in her hands.

  “Thank you.” She said, smiling as she felt its familiar weight in her arms. She looked up at Tyco and smiled proudly, wiping away a lone tear with her hand. She reached into her jacket pocket and removed her flask, handing it to him. “I wouldn’t trust the others with this,” She said, “But you - you’re the only good man in the service.” The words spilled out, more sincere than she had intended, and her voice broke as she finished. “Please try not to die.”

  Tyco let himself smile as he took the flask, for her sake as well as his. “I’ll do my best. Cover me?”

  “Cap.” She said simply, by way of a salute her voice failing as she raised herself up to her elbows. He squeezed her hand one last time and went, breaking for cover as she opened fire. Bullets raked the sand at his feet and smashed the guardhouse walls above his head, but he crossed the short distance unscathed, sliding the last few feet through a gap in the concrete barriers.

  Chip pulled him to safety, dragging him roughly across the broken concrete. He lay there, dazed, with tears in his eyes, clutching the dog tags he had hoped never to hold. And for the briefest instant, Tyco closed his eyes and let the battle wash over him.

  “With all due respect, sir, I don’t think that was very smart.” Chip growled.

  Tyco looked up at him, wide-eyed and breathing hard, and nodded. He rose to his knees and peered around the barriers, back towards Hog. Her gun had fallen silent and she lay flat on the hillside, her head resting on the hard concrete. He took her tags and placed them carefully in his front pocket.

  “She alright?” Chip asked casually. Tyco didn’t answer. Chip lit a cigarette, nodding calmly as it took. “Oh well.” He said, though the look on his face suggested he meant a lot more than that.

  “We need to go.” Flip said, appearing through the splintered guardhouse. By the sound of it, MAP-11 was still hard at work behind her, holding off the rebels behind. Tyco looked back towards the hilltop, where the truck was now fully hidden from view by the rebels advancing towards them. “Just as soon as we get a ride.” He said quietly, and picked up his rifle.

  Chip fell into his well-worn rhythm, firing, clearing the chamber, and then firing again, a kill a bullet. There was little cover on the hill above, and the rebels were easy targets. He frowned as the soldiers dropped in his rifle sight. He barely had to aim, and it felt like a waste of ammunition. He let the rifle fall in front of him and reached under his body armor, pulling out two older, lighter pistols with a faint flourish. They rested comfortably, familiarly in his hands. He looked up to find MAP-11 staring down at him.

  “Not fun if it’s not challenging.” He shrugged, explaining, and went to work.

  MAP-11 reloaded and joined him. They stood shoulder to shoulder as they fired, man and machine, or something like it. They were mirrors of precision, shooting in tandem, rhythmic and unstoppable, unflappably accurate. The rebels withered under their onslaught. Chip kept track quietly, counting to himself as he went bullet for bullet with the creature beside him, watching from the corner of his eye as every shot found its mark. It was a magnificent display, even to him, and he redoubled his efforts, matching MAP-11 with steady determination.

  And then the pistol slipped in his sweating right hand. A bullet hummed wide of its mark, whining as it caromed off the hard concrete. Not bad shooting, but not nearly good enough compared to MAP-11’s steady, unerring aim. “Freak.” Chip growled at the creature, turning away as he adjusted his grip.

  Tyco shot mechanically, conserving his ammunition, focused more on pinning down the rebels where they crouched and stopping their advance than killing them. He dropped an empty clip, pulled a spare from his vest pocket and slammed it home. He looked up to find Flip doing the same, and paused heavily, meeting her eyes.

  “When this is done, you and I got some talking to do.” He said.

  She smiled sweetly in response, like a wayward but unrepentant daughter to her father, leaned over the barrier, and took aim.

  Chip felt the magazines empty even as he squeezed his pistol triggers. He dropped them immediately, in mid-air, and swung his hands down to his vest. His fingers moved nimbly, shoving two fresh clips into the pistols before the spent cartridges had hit the ground. He raised his arms easily, in a wide, sweeping motion, picking back up exactly where he had left off.

  A shot whistled directly by him, humming past mere inches from his face, so close it left his ears ringing after it passed. He whirled, tracing its path and finding its origin, dispatching the shooter with two quick, vengeful bursts. It wasn’t until the body fell to earth that Chip realized his cigarette was gone, torn from his lips by the passing bullet.

  “What the hell - ?” he shouted, and dug in his pockets for another. His fingers came up empty, the pack moving away from him insistently, unreachable beneath his armor.

  MAP-11 stared down at him blankly, head cocked to the side as if curious about what Chip was doing.

  “Yeah, yeah,” Chip said. “Mind your own business.” And he gave up his search temporarily, standing and tending to his shooting duties instead.

  The plateau was quieter now; the floor below was littered with corpses and bullet casings. The gunfire had slowed, only breaking out in occasional, short bursts as the rebels had pulled back to cover, their numbers greatly depleted. Chip and MAP-11 could keep them at bay, for now, but there were still far too many soldiers for the team to risk an outright run for it, and Tyco didn’t feel like checking the time remaining on the countdown.

  The sky was black, dominated by the great plumes of smoke rising from the valley that hid the city from sight. And still the rebels stayed and fought, even now, without any hope of escape. They took stray shots from around heaps of debris, picking holes in the guardhouse but getting no closer than that. Chip had picked up his rifle again, but the rebels had learned, shifting constantly behind their cover and staying out of sight. They were stuck, pinned down, in a stalemate.

  An engine roared from the highway under the mountain, deafeningly loud and angry, but to Tyco’s ears, it sounded like salvation. He braved the rebel fire, creeping through the broken concrete and looking towards the road, waiting as long as he dared for the vehicle to show itself.

  It came just as he was about to duck, just as the bullets crashed tightly around him: an armored truck, like the one Flip had left destroyed on the slope. The minigun mounted on its roof roared to life as it came within range of the checkpoint as the gunner behind it opened up with vicious abandon. The team crouched, flattening themselves against the floor as whole chunks of concrete flew above them, ripped apart by the hail of bullets.

  Tyco saw Flip reach for her rocket launcher and dove towards at her, pulling her flat and ripping it from her hands.
“No!” he shouted. “We need it in one piece.”

  He tapped in quickly, unable to raise his head and find Chip, knowing he was near. “Chip.” He said. “Take him out.”

  “Gonna need some cover.” Chip called back. “He brought company.”

  Tyco sighed. Of course they had.

  The truck had stopped on the highway just below the checkpoint. Half a dozen rebels spilled from its bowels, their rifles adding to the heavy, constant fire from the turret on its roof.

  Tyco fell to his stomach, ran his rifle out past the concrete barrier, and opened fire, sending bullets flying off of the personnel carrier’s plating. The soldiers scattered, ducking away and diving behind cover. Flip kept up the pressure, sweeping her machine gun across the open street in extended bursts.

  Chip let his rifle rest on the shredded barrier, sitting in a stiff-legged crouch behind it. He sighted in carefully, unhurried by the bullets that whistled all around him, smashed against the guardhouse behind him, and sent shivers through the floor.

  Tyco rolled away abruptly as the minigun bullets chewed up the ground in front of him, stretching towards him with lethal purpose.

  “Chip - !” He shouted, his voice urgent and angry.

  Chip shook his head and smiled, sighing, his finger already squeezing the trigger. The rifle bucked as it fired.

  The bullet sliced through the air and roared towards its target with unerring accuracy, dipping slightly as it knifed through the wind, slotting itself neatly through the gap in the turret guard before embedding itself in the gunner’s chest with explosive, shuddering brutality.

  Chip’s shot landed a second later, carving through the dead man’s neck and throwing him half-out of his emplacement.

  “Are you fucking kidding me?!” He shouted, staring across at MAP-11. The visor swung towards him without expression, lingering as if waiting for him to continue. He turned away sullenly instead, digging in his pocket for his cigarettes. He found them easily, pulling the pack out roughly and shaking it.