The Link

by Isaac Hooke

  He knew that Julian and Jones were continuing to attack behind him, because the darkness continued to light up with intermittent flashes.

  He moved between the other four small structures in the shale, and placed three grenades in front of each of their shield generators. He synced the timers of the grenades to match the original three he’d planted so that all of the generators would go down at the same time.

  “It’s done!” Jason said. He returned to the edge of the rift that was closest to the Quonset, and stayed ducked beside it. “Once the two of you join me, we’ll loop to the far side of the rift, and enter from there. Now get over here!”

  He leaned past the edge of the rift and fired down the aisle toward the incoming Triceratops robots, laying down covering fire.

  Julian vaulted across, using his jumpjets for added speed, and landed beside him. Jones got up, but then the lower part of his ballistic shield failed, and he took two hits in rapid succession from the far side of the Quonset, where the flanking robots resided.

  He collapsed. “Ugh!”

  Jason ducked behind the rift, and with Julian, redirected his fire toward the flankers. Together with Jones, they managed to take down one robot that was out in the open, but there was still another hiding behind the far edge that emerged intermittently to fire.

  “Jones, get up!” Jason said. “Get over here!”

  “I can’t,” Jones said. “My feet are blown out.”

  “Then we’ll drag you,” Jason said. He glanced at Julian. “Cover me!”

  Jason was about to race across, but then Jones shouted: “Wait!”

  “What…” Jason said.

  “Someone has to stay anyway,” Jones said.

  “No,” Jason said. “I’m dragging you back.”

  “You know I’m right,” Jones said. “If those grenades don’t pierce the energy fields, I’ll keep firing until I do. And I’ll destroy them myself.”

  “You’ll be stranded,” Jason said.

  “I know that,” Jones said.

  “We’ll just place more energy grenades,” Jason said.

  “Oh really, when we don’t have any more?” Jones said.

  “I’ll go back through the rift, and get more from the others,” Jason said. But he knew Jones was right. Still, he couldn’t help but fight. He hated giving up.

  Hated losing someone.

  “There’s no time,” Jones said. “Every moment you delay, more of those bioweapons flow through to Earth. The clones already have their hands full I’m sure. Get back there and help them out. Don’t let an entire army through.”

  “He’s right,” Julian said. “The longer we delay, the less chance any of us return.”

  “Go,” Jones said. “Let me die with some dignity, at least.”

  “But it’s needless,” Jason said weakly. He activated the countdown as he spoke, setting it to one minute.

  Jones must have detected the countdown signal, because he said: “Thank you. Good luck.”

  Jason said nothing as he retreated to the far side of the rift. He had to harden himself. That was all he could do.

  Goodbye, my friend.

  It was like a part of himself was dying. How could it not be, when Jones was his mind twin?

  Jason reached the far side of the rift, and then peered past. The bioweapons flooded through the center, leaving enough room for him and Julian to enter from the sides.

  Keeping his ballistic shield between himself and the bioweapons, he rounded the perimeter of that tear in spacetime and stepped through the rift, almost cheek by jowl with the Lightning Spitters beside him.

  19

  Jason emerged into the bright sunlight of Earth to find the trees trampled before him. The bioweapons raced across the forest toward the construction site. The two Taras had abandoned their task and had instead combined with their other clones so that John and Jerry fought as Cataphracts against the Lightning Spitters, which would have otherwise dwarfed them. Maureen, Iris and Cheyanne fought beside them. Or rather, Cheyanne fought above them, her dragonfly-like wings a blur like her twin swords.

  Jason stumbled forward as something slammed into him from behind. He glanced at his rearview camera feed and realized it was Julian.

  Lightning cracked beside him and fresh red glows appeared along the inside of his ballistic shield. A heavy weight struck the shield a moment later, and he realized one of the Lightning Spitters had landed on it. The sheer mass of the thing knocked him over, and he was pinned to the ground.

  Julian’s sword slammed outward, cutting off the creature’s head, and Julian kicked the carcass off him.

  Jason stood up, firing his energy and lightning weapons. The bolts struck another Lightning Spitter, tearing open its head. Julian fired at the next one beside it.

  They continued firing like that until their weapons overheated, and then fought back to back with their swords as the Lightning Spitters surrounded them. Though Jason had accelerated his time sense, it was frustrating, because his body moved far slower than his mind, and wasn’t able to keep up. He ended up reverting his time sense closer to normal to satisfy his impatience.

  The bioweapons continued to flow from the rift in an endless line of tentacles and bodies. One of the Triceratops emerged now as well, and Jason ducked behind one of the dead carcasses in front of him as the behemoth unleashed its deadly beam.

  “Watch my back,” he told Julian.

  He retracted the sword and shield so he could use his hands, then lifted the dead body and ran toward the Triceratops. He swung the body at other Lightning Spitters in his path, stunning them, and when he reached the giant robot he began pummeling its energy shield with the body. The force field flashed with each impact, shredding the skin of the bioweapon he used as a weapon.

  Behind him, Julian swung his sword in a maelstrom of hits, downing any Lightning Spitters that got too close. He used up his ballistic shield to protect himself and Jason from the constant lighting attacks hurled by those creatures. The air pealed with thunderclaps.

  His energy and plasma weapons recharged, so he unleashed them between each strike until the Triceratops’ shield went down, and Jason was battering raw metal. Finally the behemoth went down in a broken heap.

  Jason dropped the body and extended his sword and shield to engage the Lightning Spitters with Julian.

  He glanced at his system clock after dodging a leap from one of the creatures. “The grenades should have detonated by now.”

  Julian cut off the tentacles hanging from a Lightning Spitter’s head. “Wasn’t enough to destroy the shields, apparently.”

  “We’re going to have to go back in there,” Jason said.

  He downed his latest foe, and then turned toward the rift. It wasn’t far. A few paces, and he’d be back on the other side.

  I shouldn’t have left Jones. I have a chance to rectify that.

  And then the rift collapsed.

  No.

  “He did it.” Julian was firing his energy cannon now, since the weapon had recharged.

  “Yeah,” Jason said, feeling sick to his stomach. Shouldn’t have left him.

  He turned about and swung his sword in a rage, cutting everything in his path. He trampled the trees and dead bodies beneath him. He engaged his weapons whenever the charge was strong enough.

  With Julian at his side, they continued fighting, slowly carving their way back toward the others.

  He connected Tanis. “Can you afford a few bombs to thin out this herd?”

  “We dropped a few already before you arrived,” Tanis replied. “But we can dispatch a couple more, yes. Precision strike variants.”

  “Perfect.”

  The bombs dropped not far in front of him, chewing into the bioweapons that separated Jason and Julian from the others. Gory body parts rained down from above, bouncing off their mechs with heavy thuds. The way forward was relatively clear by then; most of the remaining bioweapons were clustered around the War Forgers near the construction site ahead
. They’d been too close to the defenders to safely target.

  Jason and Julian cut their way forward, and finally rejoined the other two Cataphracts after wading through the dead bodies that surrounded them. After arriving, they fought in a tight circle with the other Cataphracts, while the smaller units of Maeran and Iris huddled between the legs and ballistic shields of the Cataphracts, striking out with their drones and energy whips, respectively, while Cheyanne weaved in and out from above to wreak havoc with her twirling swords; she occasionally launched her shockwave attack, but it wasn’t powerful enough to do more than stun any nearby Lightning Spitters.

  The ballistic shields of the Cataphracts were damaged across the board, but sometimes they were able to activate their energy fields to protect themselves from unexpected attacks. Around them a mountain of dead bioweapon bodies was forming, some of them piled up against the energy field of the construction site. The Lightning Spitters moved or ripped through those bodies to get at them.

  After ten grueling minutes, the Mind Refurbs finally slew the last of the bioweapons. On the broken and trampled trees around them lay the carcasses of the Lightning Spitters.

  “Where’s Jones?” Cheyanne asked.

  “We lost him,” Jason replied.

  “And Lori 3!” Lori said.

  “And a Tara…” Tara said.

  “We lost all the clones that were part of him,” Jason agreed. “We’ll miss them. We’ll make these Link pay.”

  Some of the bioweapons still twitched, and a few even crawled away, barely alive. Julian waded through the bodies to the latter few, and impaled them in turn, killing them.

  “That’s for Jones,” Julian said.

  John and Jerry decombined so that Tara 2 could work on extracting the teleportation device from Tara 5 once more.

  While they worked, Jason zoomed in on the first shield generator they’d destroyed on the eastern side, and confirmed that it was still offline. Though the repair drones had made a troubling amount of progress—it looked like it was half finished.

  “You’re going to have to work faster on the final two bombs,” Jason told the two Tara clones. “They’ve almost repaired the first generator.”

  “Shouldn’t be too much longer on this one,” Tara 2 said.

  In twenty minutes, Tara 2 had another teleportation bomb ready.

  The War Forgers and their clones hurried toward the western side of the construction site, and to the second-last generator that resided behind the energy shield.

  “Aria 2, you know what to do,” Jason said.

  Aria 2 escorted Tara 2 to the perimeter of the force field, and then placed an energy grenade in the teleportation device. She engaged the teleport, and it exploded next to the shield generator.

  Jason let off a short burst to confirm that the overall force field was still active, and then the team members made their way toward the south side, where the last of the generators resided.

  “When we get to the next generator, Tara 2, you get to give up your teleportation device this time,” Jason said.

  “Why can’t the original Tara give up hers?” Tara 2 complained. “Talk about preferential treatment.”

  “She’s right,” Tara said. “I can donate my teleportation device just as easily as she can.”

  “No,” Jason said. “Tara 2, you’re giving up yours.”

  “I see how it is,” Tara 2 said. “Just because I’m not in your personal harem, and we’re not having sex, you’re—”

  “It’s not about that,” Jason said, feeling a little embarrassed. “I don’t want to lose my Cataphract’s teleport ability.” That was mostly true. Though he did feel a little inclined to favor Tara, because she was part of his coterie, like her clone had said.

  “That’s fine, then,” Tara 2 said. “No really, it is.”

  Jason decided to keep his mouth shut. Best not to spur them on.

  The War Forgers and their clones reached the southern section of the construction site.

  Within, Jason spotted alien drones working frantically to raise some sort of barricade around the final remaining shield generator to protect it from the explosion they knew was coming.

  “You’re going to have to make this next extraction super quick,” Jason told Tara 5.

  “Will do.” Tara 5 knelt next to Tara 2, who had turned around to offer the upper back of her Shadow Hawk mech.

  “You’d think these aliens would open up a rift directly inside the shield somewhere,” John said. “To send in more generators.”

  “Rifts don’t go through these types of shields, I’d suspect,” Jason said. “But that does make me wonder.” He connected Tanis. “Admiral, are your bombers ready?”

  “They’ve been circling overhead ever since you knocked out the defense turrets,” Tanis said.

  “Good, because we’re almost done here,” he said. “The Link might try something before we place the final bomb.”

  “You think they’ll drop the shield early?” Tanis asked.

  “They might,” Jason said. “To send in more shield generators.”

  “All right, I’ll have the bomber AIs keep an eye out,” Tanis said. “But do let me know if you notice a change before I do.”

  “Stay on the line,” Jason said.

  “I’m all ears,” Tanis told him.

  Tara 5 finished creating the teleport bomb from Tara 2’s parts, and secured an energy grenade inside.

  Jason nodded at Aria 5, and the latter’s Dominator mech accompanied Tara 5 to the perimeter of the construction site.

  As Tara 5 knelt to place the bomb, sure enough the shield went down. Though he couldn’t see it either way, he knew because most of the drones that were building the barricade suddenly swerved away from the shield generator to attack her. They passed straight through where the shield was supposed to be.

  Tara 5 dropped the bomb to swat the incoming drones.

  “Tanis, the shield is down!” Jason sent. “Drop the bombs!”

  Jason heard the keening of falling bombs as he dashed forward to aid Aria 5 and Tara 5. They were still swatting at the drones, which swooped in to attack them with the lasers they were equipped with to augment their 3D printing capabilities. He halted, realizing he was too big to get close at the moment, and instead targeted different drones with all of his weapons. His tracking sensors activated; they fired repeatedly, programmed not to catch the friendlies in their line of fire. The other War Forgers opened fire as well, and the drones dropped in rapid, sizzling masses.

  Aria 5 swatted one of the drones toward the construction site.

  Before the careening object hit the ground, it bounced away from the energy shield.

  “It’s reactivated!” Lori said.

  The keening grew louder as the bombs closed with the world killer. There were so many high-pitched sounds; glancing up, he counted at least thirty incoming bombs. The AIs had likely dropped their entire payload.

  If those bombs hit the shield, their gone… and who knows how far away the next group of bombers are.

  “Tara 5, engage the teleportation bomb!” Jason said.

  She swatted a drone and then remotely activated the teleportation device.

  The bomb teleported inside and detonated. The half-finished barricade wasn’t enough to protect the shield generator, and the force field flashed one final time before vanishing.

  Jason unleashed an experimental shot at the world killer inside. His energy bolt struck the metal exterior, melting a spherical hole.

  “It’s offline!” Jason said. “Get back, War Forgers!”

  Jason retracted his sword and shield and scooped up Aria 5 and Tara 5 like dolls, then turned away from the construction site.

  The bombs struck the world killer behind him.

  Jason was sent flying from the shockwaves produced by the explosions. Shrapnel sprayed the backside of his mech. By his calculations, he was thrown at least two hundred meters from the site.

  He landed hard, releasing Aria 5 and Tara
5 before he hit the ground.

  “Oof!” Tara 5 said.

  Jason was surrounded by darkness. He crawled to his feet.

  He still couldn’t see anything for all the black smoke that surrounded him. He activated his LIDAR feed, and directed the constituent photons toward the construction site. The white wireframes generated by the LIDAR showed only a blast crater. There was literally nothing left of the donut structure.

  “So, it’s done,” Lori said. “Does that mean we can decombine now? My back’s getting kind of stiff.”

  Jason chuckled, filled with relief. He initiated the decombine, and their weapons rolled down the tracks that emerged, and Sophie’s micro machines broke away, reducing the size of the different components, reversing the process that had created the Cataphract.

  In a few moments, the six mechs stumbled apart. The ground was uneven below, courtesy of the trees that had broken away, leaving only trunks. That, and the crumpled bodies of the slain bioweapons.

  The dust was beginning to clear, and he could see the smoke rising from the ruins of the crater, all that remained of the construction site.

  “I hope the humans appreciate this,” Tara said beside him.

  “Probably not,” Aria said.

  Jason stared at the smoke, and couldn’t help the emotion he felt when the sky began to clear, and the sun peaked forth once more. The sun. Shining through the darkness. He would have cried tears of joy if he wasn’t a robot. As it was, his avatar was probably choking up at that very moment.

  He calmed himself, and then allowed his avatar to smile.

  “We did it,” Jason said. “We finished what we came to do. Now it’s up to the teams in orbit. If Earth falls, no one can say the War Forgers didn’t do their part.”

  With that, he lowered himself to the dirt, and slumped in exhaustion. Not physical exhaustion, but mental.

  “You okay?” Lori asked, sitting beside him in her Stalker mech.

  He reached out, and gripped her metal hand in his own. “I’ve never been better.”

  Her avatar grinned widely, and blinked as the tears fell down her virtual cheeks.