Burning Eagle

by Navin Weeraratne

  “So you’re saying Amli wasn’t a one-off? These Von Neumann devices are specifically homing in on settlements for their carbon?”

  “It certainly seems that way,” he replied. “Especially in the deep desert areas, humans are a great source of carbon, phosphorus, nitrogen, hydrogen, all the good stuff for making nanomachines. We’re limited to just using this old oil refinery, and we’re controlling it. Out there, it’s the genie out of its bottle. Making more genies all the time. We all know where that goes.”

  “What about evacuation and warnings?” asked Nieman. “Sir, a HAM radio network is going up. We can warn people at risk to leave their homes.”

  “There’s no point,” Baumgartner sighed. “Where would people flee to?”

  “Maybe just the nearest villages then? We can also use the Crossbows the Washington sent us to evacuate them to Kashi.”

  “Captain, we don’t have the manpower to start airlifting villagers, even with help from the New Urban Police. We can’t even feed them anymore, since the Rice District went up in flames.”

  Jahandar gave Koirala a look.

  “Lieutenant Kastner,” he continued, “ Where’s my space launcher? I need laser sats up there if we’re ever going to mount an effective response.”

  “I can’t get you the launcher yet,” Kastner shook his head, “I can’t spare the capacity to build it.”

  “We’re being hit every fourteen hours Sir,” Nieman interjected. “If Lieutenant Kastner hadn’t given us more troops, we might not have held this morning.”

  “So you’re in a hole,” Koirala inserted herself. “You can’t print enough bombers or get laser sats up, so instead you’re building defensive forces. Meanwhile, the enemy is on the offense, moving unchecked, and growing its capacity faster than you are. If your strategy is to wait here till you all die, you’re doing pretty well.”

  The Droptroopers looked uncomfortable. Baumgartner cleared his throat.

  “The strategy is mine, Colonel. We need more aircraft before we can start bombing the fogs, and a space bombardment curtain is the only effective backbone for a Von Neumann response.”

  “This refinery will be overrun and your men all killed, unless you abandon that course,” she looked him right in the eye. “You can start hitting their ability to feed and grow immediately, and with limited resources, and see an immediate improvement. You could send them into remission at best, and buy time for the space bombardment curtain, at the least.”

  “And that idea is?” he asked.

  “Bomb the villages before the fogs can feed on them,” she said. “Deny it food, use fuel-air bombs to make sure to burn off all the volatiles.”

  The engineers in the room had turned around. They regarded her, as if suddenly noticing her for the first time. Some smirked. None smiled.

  “Is that a joke?” asked Baumgartner.

  “It’s our whole mission.”

  “Our mission Colonel, is to save these people.”

  “Our mission is to destroy the aliens, utterly. You put off doing what has to be done, even for a few hours, and you jeopardize this.”

  “Can you hear yourself, Colonel? Do you know what you are saying?”

  “You’re being sentimental; you’re letting it cloud your judgment.”

  “I don’t know how you Special Forces do things, but the Droptroopers do not conduct pre-emptive genocide, Colonel.”

  “The decision whether these people live or die, has already been made for you, Colonel,” said Koirala. “It’s for you to decide whether some of them die, or all of them.”

  “I’ve conducted Von Neumann response before, Colonel.”

  “Not like this you haven’t. Tannenburg was terraforming nano gone bad, this is military grey goo.”

  “That we are about to deal a great reversal to,” said Baumgartner, raising his voice slightly. “Cullins has the Xeno-Transcendent brain, trapped. It’s only a matter of time before he destroys it.”

  “Even if the Commodore destroys the brain, that doesn’t mean the Von Neumann plague will stop. You can’t build your strategy around the Washington.”

  “Well, I’ll be sure to invite your input into those plans, when I want it.” He turned away.

  “You’re going to take my input,” she stepped into his space and held his arm, “whether you like it or not. There is no other way, Baumgartner. Eliminate the feeding grounds, or your people will die.”

  Men glanced around the room at each other.

  “May I remind you Ma’am,” he growled, shaking his arm free, “that while we share rank, I am in command. Contain yourself, Colonel. Or I will have you removed.”

  She smirked, put her arm around him, and leaned in close.

  “You command your Droptroopers, Baumgartner. But don’t think you command me. As long as you want the support of the reinforcements from the Washington; the Crossbows, the marines, even my little squad and I - I suggest you remember that.”

  He shook her arm off and pushed her back. “Are you threatening me?”

  Droptroopers stood up. Koirala’s team formed a diamond, hands going to holsters. Eyes hardened.

  “Look, we have thirteen hours before those things come back,” said Nieman throwing up his hands, “and respectfully Colonels, neither of you are helping right now.”

  “Captain,” Baumgartner’s eyes were steel. “Arrest the Colonel and her operators, and send them to the brig.”

  10:24 am

  “Well that went well,” said Jahandar.

  They sat facing each other in the APC, zip-ties binding their wrists. Their weapons, webbing, and body armor had been taken away. A radio squawked from the front cabin. Through a dirty glass pane, they could see the heads of the driver and the guard.

  “What now?” he asked.

  “We get loose,” said Koirala. “We get our gear back, and we head for Kashi’s Deep Space Array.”

  “The Deep Space Array?” Khalid made a face. “Why?”

  “Because it’s powerful enough to get a signal through the chaff cloud to the Washington. I have to ask Cullins for permission to bomb the villages.”

  “He’ll say no,” said Jahandar immediately. “And he’ll reaffirm that Captain Zim’s marines and the Crossbows are to report to Baumgartner.”

  “Which is the right thing,” said Saleh. “If we start quarrelling, we’ll be finished. Even a defensive strategy like Baumgartner’s is better than the forces splitting.”

  “Yes, and I know he’ll say no,” said Koirala. “He’s even more sentimental than Baumgartner. But I have to ask. I need the confirmed answer.”

  “What good does that do?” asked Jahandar.

  “I wasn’t exaggerating back there. Did you noticed that none of the other Drop troops argued against me? Under the circumstances, this is how you conduct Von Neumann response. We have to take away their feedstocks and slow them down.”

  “Yes but the human cost of what you’re asking – “

  “Listen to me. They’re growing exponentially. In twenty-four hours, we will all be dead, Jahandar. In forty-eight, so will everything else except bacteria. They won’t last much longer than that, either. Can you understand this?”

  Jahandar looked down, scowling.

  “That’s why I need to contact the Washington. Cullins will likely say no to my request, and when he does, that triggers a different set of orders. Orders from Sun Tzu.”

  “What orders?” they all looked up.

  “Burning Eagle,” she replied. “In the event that the UEF command structure has failed – and I get to decide what that looks like - I am authorized, no, ordered, to activate a secret weapons platform.”

  “A weapons platform?” Khalid’s jaw dropped. “Sweet!”

  “Is it still there?” asked Saleh.

  “You’ve not said anything about it, all this time.” Jahandar frowned.

  “It was need to know, and frankly, no one needed to. I don’t know if it’s still there or not, but it’s a black asset
. There are no records of it anywhere, so that might have kept it secure. If it’s still up there, I can feed it the coordinates for the villages.”

  “Best news I’ve heard all day,” said Khalid, standing up. He held up his bound wrists. “Are we doing this?”

  “We’re doing this,” she got up, and stepped towards the front cabin. She banged against the glass.

  “Pull over, and get out of the vehicle,” she yelled. The helmets turned and looked, then turned back.

  “Pull over, now.”

  The heads didn’t move.

  She clenched her fists, and punched through the reinforced glass.

  19:37 pm

  Jahandar made his way down the street. He moved slowly, back to the wall. He reached an abandoned cart, rotting fruit lay rolled and mashed around it. He took cover behind it, and scanned the street. He blinked into infra-red, and saw only a few rats. He set down his gun’s bipod, and covered the street. Then he raised his hand and signaled.

  Behind him, Khalid and Saleh rose from cover and advanced, guns ready. They passed him in the street, and moved ahead towards new cover.

  There had been no fighting on the hill: the roads were unbroken and windows still held their glass. Most shops were boarded up, some decorated with bright graffiti. Rubbish lay uncollected in heaps, writhing with rats and insects.

  Koirala came up alongside him. Her face was blacked out, her eyes shined white.

  “Where is everyone?” he whispered.

  “Praying I guess,” she hissed back. “Fuckers are doing mass prayers for days at a stretch. Not even eating or sleeping. Or maybe cause it’s not safe here anymore. I don’t know. Who cares?”

  “We need to charge our cloaks somewhere.”

  She nodded. “We should be able to at the array.”

  Khalid and then Saleh got behind a large, dry, street fountain. They started signaling frantically.

  “Fucking hell,” she braced the sniper rifle on the cart and peered down the sight.

  “They’re doing it wrong!” he hissed. “What the fuck are they saying?”

  “That they miss Battlefield Control. Cloak if you still have power.”

  Jahandar looked down his sight.

  A group of figures emerged from a side street. They wore ragged hoods over their heads. Some wore crowns or gags made from barbed wire. Their body armor was piece meal, some of UEF make. Black rifles and meat cleavers seemed their main weapons. They carried flaming torches for light and chanted on the marched.

  The platoon turned, and began walking up the street.

  The air cracked, and a chanter was punched back off his feet, blood arcing from his skull.

  The operators opened up, spraying the platoon with high velocity rail rounds. Caught in the open, chests erupted and heads burst. Barbed wire tore and flew spinning into the air. Men screamed.

  The survivors went prone, using the dead for cover. They fired back, their powder weapons clattering loudly. Cement misted and chips sprayed as fire concentrated on the fountain. Saleh and Khalid crouched down and curled. Rounds zipped around Jahandar, wood splinters tore off the cart and slashed into his face.

  “Saleh and Khalid are pinned!” he yelled.

  “Keep firing or we’ll be too!”

  Koirala primed a grenade and flung it. It landed amongst the prone gunmen. They screamed and scrambled away, Jahandar dropped two more as they ran.

  The grenade hissed, spun around, and fizzled.

  The gunmen jeered and renewed firing. More rounds splattered into the cart, chewing it apart. A hammer struck him Jahandar in the shoulder, knocking him backwards.

  “Fuck!”

  “You okay?!”

  “Yeah!” he pulled a smoking, crushed, round from his armor. It burned his fingers. “We can’t stay here!”

  Coughing broke out amongst the gunmen.

  “Breathe deep, assholes,” Koirala lay on her back and grinned.

  More start coughing. Some wheezed. The volume of fire faltered. Saleh and Khalid popped back around, and returned fire.

  “Let’s finish this!” Koirala got back up and aimed.

  The gunmen were all coughing now. They rolled on the ground, clutching their throats and tearing their nails. Jahandar stood up, rifle aimed.

  “Nanocloud grenade?”

  “Yes,” she answered. She lowered her rifle. “Let them suffer.”

  He clutched his aching shoulder. “Happy to.”

  They started walking forward.

  “What a group of insurgents doing sneaking around out here?” he asked. “We have no intel about this.”

  “Our intel hasn’t been too great lately,” she replied. “And perfectly normal people have been turning into insurgents overnight. That could by why there’s no one here.”

  “Should we warn HQ about an impending attack?”

  “No,” she shook her head. “We can’t afford to.”

  Khalid and Saleh stood up from behind the fountain. Khalid’s rifle hung by its strap. He was gripping the shredded stump that had been his right arm.

  “You alright, soldier?” Koirala started walking towards him.

  “I’ve had worse,” he smiled weakly. Saleh put his pack down and pulled out a medkit.

  “That you have,” she reached him, and held up his arm, peering at it. “Bleeding has stopped. Go to love how quickly our model does that. You feeling faint?”

  “A little.”

  “Then sit down, dumbass.”

  Saleh pulled out a roll of gauze.

  “No,” she shook her head. “We’re going to need his arm back. Is it around here?”

  “Yes,” said Jahandar walking up, looking about him. “It’s certainly around here.”

  “You want to do a battlefield regrow?” asked Saleh, still holding the gauze ready. “We don’t have the feedstock for the medical nanites to use.”

  Koirala looked down at a corpse. It started steaming, bubbles starting forming under the skin.

  “Oh, we’ve got plenty.”

  19:59 pm

  “Where are they?” Nieman looked through his binoculars. “Where the hell are they?”

  Flares popped over the desert, casting false daylight. Robotic support drones hunkered behind berms, launcher rails and auto-loading mortars ready. Automated, Heavy Laser Guns poked out from barricades of diamond-reinforced, fused sand. Gleaming, black, robot infantrymen crouched in their mathematically perfect trenches. They stared back at Nieman with a thousand different serial numbers.

  “What’s wrong, Kastner?” he turned back. “What’s going on? We should be able to see them by now!”

  “I-I don’t know,” the engineer blubbered. “I really don’t know!”

  “Calm down Son,” Baumgartner put his hand on the seated man’s shoulder. “Send the scout drones further out, maybe the Vee Enns have just changed their tactics.”

  A robot trooper climbed out of its trench, and stood in plain view. It faced towards the admin building.

  “What’s it doing?” Baumgartner frowned.

  Several more robots climbed out of the trench.

  “AI controllers, what’s going on?” asked Nieman. “Get them out of the open!” Men frowned, peered, and raced fingers over consoles and holos.

  All along the trenches, the robots were climbing out and facing the admin block. People exchanged worried glances and murmured.

  “Just what the hell is going on here Niemen?” yelled Baumgartner. “This is not the time for a software glitch!”

  Pistons slid, and the support drones began to clank and turn. They faced the admin building, stopped, and lowered their launch rails.

  “Son of a bitch!” Baumgartner barked. “Everyone get down!”

  The firing started.

  20:29 pm

  The Deep Space Array rose atop the hill. It was a five-storey tower of red metal, spider-webbed with antennae and dishes. Down below was the admin block, UEF grey and white. Beside it was a small solar collector bank. A chain li
nked fence enclosed it, with only KEEP OUT signs for protection.

  “Movement on the second floor,” Jahandar said into his mike. He squeezed the trigger and shattered a row of windows. Glass tumbled down in blades.

  “I see it,” Khalid replied. New, raw fingers smarted as he crouched behind the burned out jeep. He looked right through it in infrared, and fired from the side. “Two men, dragging something.”

  “Must be a heavy weapon,” Jahandar peered down his sight. “I can’t get a shot. Koirala, you in position yet?”

  “Getting there,” across the street, she kicked open a door but then stepped aside. Bullets erupted and stitched the ground, kicking up puffs of sand. She primed a flashbang and tossed it in. Light and thunder clapped out the open door way. She ran in, pistol drawn, firing head shots.

  “I shot three more running out the back,” Saleh’s voice rasped in his Jahandar’s earphone. “Look like technical sorts.”

  “What do technical sorts look like?” asked Khalid.

  “Like they’re running out the back.”

  High powered rounds streamed out of a broken window. They shredded the jeep Khalid crouched behind, and picked towards Jahandar. He ran and dove behind a building. It shook with the fire, bullets ripping into the brickwork.

  “I’m pinned and I can’t see shit!” he yelled.

  Pop.

  The sniper rifle’s round entered the gunner’s eye. An instant later it exploded out the back of his skull.

  Inhale. Squeeze. Pop.

  The loader’s throat sprayed out, and he toppled over the heavy machine gun.

  “Heavy weapon neutralized,” said Koirala into her mike. “Take the building, take the building!”

  Jahandar and Khalid tore across open ground for the doorway. Saleh came in through the back, PDW ready. Koirala scanned the windows for movement.

  “We’re in,” Jahandar slammed in a fresh clip. “I’m not seeing any more heat signatures.”

  “Negative heat signatures,” said Saleh.

  “Careful, they may have left booby traps,” Koirala replied. She lowered her rifle. There was nothing left to kill.