by T. R. Harris
********
Charlie Fox and the pilots of nine Goliaths placed their craft in the space between the perimeter of the base and the hangars. If the Goliaths were the targets, the attacking drones would have a hard time taking them all out, even with over ninety approaching units. Yet the other way to neutralize the DARPA drones—and frankly the easiest—would be to take out the pilots first. Then the units would be sitting ducks. So as Charlie and the others watched the first wave of former RDC combat drones closing on them, they knew they were both an assault force and a defensive line. And for Fox, he had exactly forty-eight seconds of flying experience on the quarter-million-dollar UAV.
Fortunately, he didn’t have time to worry about his predicament before the two forces joined and instinct took over.
For piloting a supposedly stealth combat drone, Fox was startled at how accurate the fire was from the attackers. The first few seconds of the engagement was spent dodging incoming fire rather than singling out targets to strike.
He aimed his camera at where he knew other Goliaths were in the air, and that’s when he noticed an obvious glowing and flickering in the dark sky to his right. “Damn it, they can see us!” he announced. “We glow in the dark. Break off and pursue. Stealth is not going to cut it this time.”
In his first strafing run on the incoming hijacked RDC drones, Fox was able to shred six of them before he detected buffering from his tail end. He scanned his aft camera and saw at least ten of the red, white, and blue painted UAVs coming up behind him, filling the air with missiles and gunfire.
The rear view camera went black, and he noticed a slight pitch to the left as something else went flying off the Goliath. Now with a full minute of experience under his belt, Charlie Fox decided to go for broke. He aimed the craft straight up and gunned the motors. The drone shot off into the dark sky, leaving his adversaries far behind. He watched on his heads-up display as his speed jumped past one hundred seventy miles per hour, which was faster than any drone he’d ever piloted. He let out a soft whistle, just as he began to pull the drone over in a large looping maneuver.
He sent the drone screaming toward the ground, passing two hundred miles per hour in a flash. Below him he saw a cluster of enemy units streaking after a faint object that was glistening in the night. Charlie locked his guns on ten targets simultaneously and with a press of the trigger unleashed a torrent of hot lead. The Goliath slowed noticeably from the recoil of the guns, but soon regained forward momentum. All the targets splintered into a thousand pieces.
“Anyone keeping count?” he asked into the comm.
“Still over sixty active signals,” an unknown voice stated. “Concentrations to the north, circling back in and headed your way.”
“Much thanks, Mr. Wizard. Keep us informed.”
A series of bright flashes assailed his night-adjusted eyes to his right. He glanced down and saw a line of missile flame headed for the eastern hangar.
“Command hangar, missiles incoming, impact eastern side! Take cover!”
It was only two seconds between warning and impact before the entire side of the metal hangar exploded. Flames lashed out and half the roof bent over toward the main runway. Then a series of even brighter explosions appeared further off to his right, over the vast open expanse of the flight line. But this time is was from exploding drones and not from missile fire.
“Mr. Wizard, you still with us?”
“Yep, I’m in the control tower. Looks like another eight hostiles just bought the farm.”
“Thanks for the update.”
Fox guided his drone down toward the crumpled east side of the hangar. He zoomed in the focus of the forward camera to get a better look inside the building. There were people running about, helping the injured and dragging away the dead, but as far as he could tell a good half of the interior was still intact. Huge tractors used in towing aircraft had been lined up near the east wall of the hangar and had absorbed much of the explosive force. Even then, that entire side of the building now stood open and vulnerable to a second attack.
“Calling all Goliaths, this is Fox. Looks like the strategy has changed, they’re going for the hangars now. Help form a shield around them. If they take out the pilot hangar, the mission in Pakistan fails, and all of this will have been for nothing. Oh, and by the way, we’ll be dead too. Let’s not let that happen.”
There was chorus of acknowledgements from the other Goliaths, which now numbered seven in total, two having been destroyed or rendered inoperable from enemy fire.
“A new wave is coming up from the west and south,” reported Mr. Wizard.
“I see them. Nothing gets past, okay? Now let’s do some engaging!”
********
“We must take out their command hangar,” Abdul-Shahid Almasi was saying. “Once we do that, the drones outside will fall from the sky.”
“Unless they take us out first,” said General Burkov.
“Our center is underground and fortified, theirs is out in the open and unshielded. And our defenders here are now on-site. We should prevail.”
“Yet you did not anticipate being under attack yourself.”
“What is your problem, General? Since when are the Russians the smartest military minds on the planet? I did not hear you voice any concerns for such an attack, not until you employed your incredible powers of hindsight. Not every event can be predicted, and your second-guessing and snarky criticisms are getting tiresome. I would welcome some constructive suggestions for a change, though I doubt you are capable of formulating any.”
The fat Russian officer flared with anger and took a step in Almasi’s direction. In a blurred motion, the slender, wiry terrorist produced an eight-inch long combat knife and placed it against the pale, flabby skin of the general’s neck. He pressed the Russian against the back wall of the huge chamber, in the shadows where they couldn’t be seen.
“I have personally beheaded no fewer than sixteen men in my time, Nikolay, and four of my bombs have taken the lives of invading infidels … just like you. Do not push me further. I have real blood on my hands. You only have reports and paperwork as proof of your warrior fire. You are in my world now, and it is so much more savage and primitive than you can ever imagine.”
Almasi withdrew the blade and backed away. The Russian general, having never experienced his potential death so intimately, was stunned into silence, sweat forming on his forehead.
After a moment, he took a deep breath and tugged at the bottom of his green service jacket to pull it down tight over a protruding belly. “I will allow you this one indiscretion, Almasi, but be assured I do not favor threats or physical assault.”
“Then you are in the wrong business, General. This is what the real face of war looks like. If you cross me one more time, I will hack at your fat neck until your head rolls at my feet. Do not doubt me.”
Almasi turned his back on the Russian and walked away to resume direct command of not only a battle raging above their heads, but another taking place on the opposite side of the planet.
Chapter 27
“Incoming, launching countermeasures!” The voice was that of a military pilot which Charlie Fox had never met, even as the man sat in a command pod twenty feet away.
“We have countermeasures?” Fox queried.
“Look on your board. Four buttons on the left side—flares and ball bearings. I’m sending them all.”
The barrage of four tight missile trails came down from high above, closing on the western hangar—the building housing the drone pilots. Suddenly the sky between the hangar and the incoming streaks of yellow fire filled with a cloud of brilliant light, as well as the reflections off thousands of tiny balls of metal. The missiles launched by the RDC drones were fire-and-forget, so they continued along the same trajectory even though the path was blocked by the countermeasures. They entered the bright cloud a split second later and disintegrated.
“Great job!” Fox cried out.
“Yeah, but
that’s all I have. These units were not designed to go up against this many advanced UAVs.”
“Now that I know about the countermeasures, I can pick up some of the slack.”
From far below, another missile trail sprang into existence. “Where the hell did that one come from?” Fox called out.
“I see him. He’ll be toast in about two seconds.”
In the meantime, the missile fired from the doomed drone was still on its way toward the pilots’ hangar, and there was nothing any of them could do to stop it.
“Xander, get ready, we’re about to take a hit.”
The missile struck the middle of the huge south-facing rollaway door, puncturing the lightweight metal with ease before passing through to the interior of the building. Half a heartbeat later it exploded.
Charlie Fox, ensconced in a control pod three rows in and facing away from the hangar door, felt the blast of heat even as it spared his pod from any serious damage. However, the row of pods closest to the door didn’t fare as well. Nine control stations took the brunt of the blast, deforming the compact metal and plastic pods into unrecognizable hunks of debris. No one could have survived the crushing impact of the blast.
Fox looked around at the surviving pods. He knew only one other person in the room intimately, and that was Xander Moore. He didn’t see him, but he did recognize three other members of Xander’s Karachi Goliath team.
“Xander, are you okay? Xander…?”
“Yeah, I’m fine. Who was hit? Can anyone tell?”
There was an awkward silence on the comm. ‘C’mon, someone take a look.”
“Jeremy’s Goliath just crashed into the garage building.” It was the trembling voice of Hugh Barden.
“Jeremy, come in. Answer me.”
Silence.
“Dammit!” Xander shouted.
“Xander, take a look at the side of the garage where Jeremy crashed.” It was Karen Prado on the comm.
“What?”
“I said take a look at the building. I think there’s a ramp leading down.”
Xander shook his head. He had known Jeremy longer than any of others, since second grade as a matter of fact, long before they’d discovered drones. “A ramp?”
“Yeah, I’m blasting open the front doors. This may be our ticket to the big leagues.”
The area in and above Almasi’s compound was now filled with nearly a hundred buzzing drones, all performing an elaborate ballet of sorts. Billy and his Panthers were now on-site and blasting through the auto drones without too much trouble, even as the RPAs controlled from underground did a number on his squadron. The smaller drones seemed content with fighting amongst themselves, so when Karen sent two missiles into the wooden doors of the long garage, the remaining four Goliaths, under Xander’s command, darted inside the building without resistance.
Curt’s drone was badly damaged, more than he’d first suspected. Half of the propellers were idle and he was down to only a handful of munitions.
“I’m not going to do much good down below. I’ll stay up here and warn of any hostiles coming your way.”
“That’ll work. Okay, the rest of you, this can get tricky. I’ve had my share of battles within office buildings and shopping malls, but never with a unit this big. Switching to ground-mode. I think we’ll be able to maneuver better. When we get below, spread out. First one finding the pilots room gives a shout out. And then fuck ‘em up good. Most of those pilots will be controlling the drones outside the hangar, the same ones who killed Jeremy. Let’s return the favor.”
The ramp leading underground started off wide and with a high ceiling to accommodate the construction equipment used to build the underground complex. There were four main corridors leading from the ramp, and three of these were covered by the remaining Goliaths. Xander took the corridor on the far right, Karen disappearing into the one next to him, while Hugh shot down the far left tunnel.
To his relief, Xander found that the main corridors remained relatively spacious. In fact, a pair of golf carts could pass easily by one another in the passageways. He now had the Goliath riding on the four rotor rings. The controls for ground travel were a little touchier—or at least his lack of experience with them made it appear so—and he scraped the walls of the corridors more than once before getting the hang of it.
The labyrinth was huge, and included living quarters, equipment rooms, and dining facilities, plus a major control room packed full of bulky pilot stations. To build and supply such a vast underground complex, adequately-sized passageways were needed. This made the going fairly easy for the huge drones, even though there would no sneaking up on an unsuspecting terrorist, not with a Goliath.
Although virtually invisible and silent in their mechanical operation, the Goliaths nonetheless stirred up vast quantities of dust and sand, even in ground mode. The wind from the two horizontal rings, plus the smaller pusher blades at the rear, produced a dull swishing sound that echoed down the unfinished drywall and mottled concrete passageways.
All along the way the team was met with waiting gunfire. Occasionally, an armed man would appear from a side room and fire at the drone. The rifle fire would cause no damage to his UAV, so Xander ignored such attacks, choosing to save his ammo for when it really counted.
“I just entered a larger room down corridor number four,” Hugh Barden reported. “No sign of the pilots yet—holy crap! Now there’s something you don’t see every day.”
“What are you talking about?” Xander asked.
“Just the largest, meanest drone I’ve ever seen.”
“It is active?”
“Active? Oh yeah. It just came out of a side room and caught me from behind.”
“What are you trying to say, Hugh?” Xander pulled up a side of the goggles and looked to his left at Barden’s control pod. The man was leaning back in the seat and shaking his head.
“Nothing really, Number One, except that I’m dead. I assume that was Jonas’s Ninja. The bastard just plastered my Goliath against the far wall. I’m out for the duration.”
Xander slipped the goggles back on, and was instantly halfway around the world again. He hadn’t heard any sounds of a battle taking place, so Jonas must have fired without warning and took out Hugh in a single shot. Now his force was down to just two Goliaths—his and Karen’s—and with Jonas Lemon lurking somewhere, in control of the deadliest drone ever made.
The incoming call alarm sounded again. This time Xander knew who was calling, so he activated only the audio.
“Uh oh, Xander, what you can’t see can still kill you,” said the voice of Jonas Lemon. “I told you I’d be around. So who was it that I just crushed?”
“It was me, you bastard,” Hugh Barden announced over the intercom. Xander had linked the communication to the rest of the team, just in case Jonas gave away a clue as to his location.
“Now that gives me great pleasure,” said Lemon. “I’d say that other than Xander, you’re the one I most wanted to beat the most.”
“Is this still about Linda what’s-her-name?” Hugh asked. “You know she never liked you anyway.”
“No, she preferred pretty boys like you—brainless geeks with a flashy smile.”
“Eat your heart out, you ugly muther. If I recall now, she was the best I ever had, so you really missed out on something special.”
“Keep at it, Barden. Now I’m filthy rich and I just knocked you out of the game. So sit back and be quiet like a good little boy while I do the same to the rest of your Team Alpha. You see, Xander, that’s been your major weakness throughout the years. You’ve always relied on others to help fight your battles. I only counted on me, so I was better than you.”
“Yeah, and that go-it-alone attitude got your ass fired and your wife out the door with your daughter. I understand she’s remarried, and that Katie loves him, unlike the hatred she now feels for her real dad. Oh, I’m sorry … is it too soon?”
“Stop trying to bait me, Moore. It won’t work. Bu
t I’ll tell you what I will do. First of all, I’m going to take out the remaining Goliaths you have in Karachi, and then I’m going to take over one of Billy’s little JEN-Tech drones outside your hiding place in Washington. Then I’m going to kill all of you, and not just your machines, but your flesh and blood bodies. That will be a new experience. It’s rare when we get to use our drones to kill a real enemy. So let’s get the preliminaries out the way so I can get on with the real contest. I’m in the furthest corridor to the north, the one marked with the large bronze flowerpot. There’s a connecting tunnel between all the south to north corridors. I shouldn’t be too hard to find.”
“Switch to backup frequency,” Xander ordered, and a moment later he said, “Don’t take the bait, Karen. We’re here to find the pilots room and that’s it. Maybe after that’s done we can go after Jonas.”
“I’m tempted,” Karen said, “but I know to follow orders. I haven’t found anything promising this way. I’m cutting south down another corridor. I assume most of these tunnels j—”
Xander could sense the dead air on the frequency. “Karen, are you there? Karen…?”
The line crackled. “I’m here. Comm cut out after the two RPGs were fired.”
“RPGs?”
“Yep. They missed, but I won’t be leaving the same way I came in. The tunnel’s collapsed. Where are you?”
“Hell if I know. All the corridors look alike. Wait … this looks interesting.”
The corridor Xander was in suddenly expanded in width and height, and he rolled into a large circular room with three double-wide doors lining the far wall. All three were closed.
Chapter 28
Charlie Fox was about to drop down and survey the damage to the control hangar when he was suddenly swarmed by half-a-dozen flag-colored drones. He spun the Goliath around and in a fit of rage gunned the throttle, plowing directly into the middle of the incoming flight.
