by M. R. Forbes
"I appreciate your feedback, Sergeant," he said at last. "We're going to Angeles."
Kowalski made a sour face but nodded. "Yes, sir."
"Riiigg-ahh," Shank said in agreement.
27
They waited thirty minutes, to be sure there would be no contact from any of the missing squads or the two missing mechs. When the comm channels remained silent, they loaded the extra gear packs onto the Mount and began the hike through the woods, north towards the city of Angeles.
Named after the city on Earth, it abutted the Greater Ocean, a glimmering jewel of pristine water that stretched for thousands of miles out to the horizon. The city had been home to two million people before the Federation assault had been pre-empted by mass evacuations, the inhabitants still in the process of returning when the Tetron had arrived.
They made good progress through the Preserve, the exo-enhanced soldiers setting a good pace for the two mechs to follow. Shank took point, roaming the front of the larger group and using the Tactical to sight into the distance, making sure it was clear before signaling them forward. A little trial and error gave them the reach of their signal range and they spread out around it, covering the widest points of the perimeter with Mitchell's Zombie in the center, where he relayed messages from one member of the group to the next.
Three hours passed. They covered thirty kilometers in that time, the grunts keeping an even run, their muscles spared by the powered synthetics. The mechs managed the speed without difficulty, feet rising and falling in an even cadence, leaving deep impressions in ground that was damp from recent rain.
They paused at the four-hour mark, taking turns relieving themselves in the bushes. Even Zed was offered a few minutes to stretch her legs and empty her bladder into the air instead of her suit, with Mitchell standing guard over the group. MREs were passed around in silence and eaten in a hurry before they dispersed again to their positions to resume the trek.
Mitchell fell into the monotony of the march, keeping his eyes on the squad spread around him, accepting their minute-by-minute reports. There was something comforting about the activity, about the organization and discipline. Even Cormac managed to stay on topic, issuing his statements from his position as the rear guard without adding unnecessary chatter. Nobody could argue the Riggers weren't well-trained when it counted.
It helped him keep his mind away from Christine. It helped him forget about the outcome of the mission and to concentrate on the activity instead. It put him back in a familiar place, a familiar state of mind. He didn't worry about who or what the enemy was. He didn't think about who was shooting at him, or who he was shooting back at. He was a warrior. He was doing his job. He was doing what he did best.
A soldier fighting a battle.
At the moment, it was that simple.
"Colonel." Jones' voice was excited, and years of training snapped him back to a ready state in an instant. "We've got incoming, closing fast. Too fast to be on the ground."
Mitchell tilted the head of the mech towards the trees. They were thick everywhere, but he could see the outline of blue sky mixed in above it. His p-rat sounded when it picked up the new target.
"Drones," Jones said. "Just passed over my head."
"Shank, we've got drones from the east. Can you spot?"
"Shit. Tracking."
The ships passed by a second later, three of the wedge-shaped vehicles rocketing over their heads.
"Negative. Too fast," Shank said.
"Think they saw us, sir?" Zed asked.
"No way they made contact coming over that fast," Cormac said. "No way."
The mech's reactors were shielded to hide their signature, and they had jamming equipment amongst their array of sensors. That didn't make them completely invisible, and out here where there was nothing but trees and small animals?
"Hold up," Mitchell said.
He didn't need a response from the team to know they were taking cover and waiting. There was nowhere for the large machine to hide, so he stood motionless, watching the sky.
Seconds passed. The ships vanished from the grid when they hit the edge of their diminished sensor range.
"Where do you think they're going?" Cormac asked.
Mitchell continued to stare at the sky, one eye focused on the grid his p-rat laid over it, waiting for the drones to return. They were unmanned, typically used for civilian law enforcement. They had been moving as though they had a different purpose. What was it?
Ten more seconds went by in tense silence.
"I think we're clear, Colonel," Shank said. "I've got a good sight through the trees. They're gone."
"Yeah, but where were they going?" Cormac repeated.
"It doesn't matter. They didn't come back."
"Let's get moving," Mitchell said. He lowered his gaze back to the trees, scanning ahead and picking out his path around them. He watched the spots that represented the rest of the Riggers on the overlay slowly shifting as they headed out again.
"Colonel-" Cormac said.
"Firedog, shut it," Shank said.
"But. Colonel-"
"Fire-"
"Shank, wait," Mitchell said. "Firedog, what is it?"
"I was just thinking, Colonel. I studied the planetary geography before we made the drop. We all did. There's nothing out that way, right? I mean, nothing but big agri-factories and shit? Except that's wrong. If I remember right, there's a Sonosome plant ahead of all that farmland."
"Sonosome?" Zed asked. "They make farm equipment, don't they?"
"Yeah, yeah. That's the one."
"What's your point, Firedog?" Shank said.
"Well, the same kind of alien that took the planet took the Goliath, right? And it left us this old starship all tricked out with new tech? Well, I had this thought in my head that, I mean, what if this alien was here, and it didn't have access to factories that build military equipment, but it does have factories that build heavy farming mechs and crop spraying ships? What if it changed the programming on the bots that build it all, and told them to make something else?"
Mitchell looked back at the sky, his mind working through the scenario Cormac was presenting. The drones had gone overhead in a hurry, and they weren't acting like drones. The Tetron knew everything about them, about all of their history, all of their tech. Origin said they had been born from it. How could they not know how to control it?
Or modify it?
They knew Mitchell and his crew were immune to their efforts to control them. They knew he was fighting back and had already destroyed one of them. Was there a value in assuming that the assets they had already conquered would be enough, or was it smarter to build a bigger war machine?
Not only smarter. More logical.
They had the resources. They had the ability. Origin had said Liberty was a foothold planet. It wasn't just a place for the Tetron to claim and grow roots. It was a place for them to begin to expand their strength. Resources to send forward, to bolster the front lines. Origin could make anything with the right resources, including weapons.
Including people.
There was no reason to believe the Tetron wouldn't do the same.
"We need to move faster," Mitchell said. "Double time. If Firedog's right, the enemy's building a bigger army as we speak, and who the hell knows what it'll be capable of."
"Frigging hell," Shank said.
"My thoughts exactly," Mitchell replied.
28
Christine had seen the dropship enter the atmosphere, trailing fire and smoke and starfighters that couldn't stay aloft in gravity and crashed into the ground. She had run across the rooftop of the building, giving chase to the scene, giving witness to yet another invasion of the planet.
Who would have ever thought the furthest inhabitable planet in the Delta Quadrant would ever be so valuable to anyone?
Her eyes had followed the action, her body feeling every surge of energy when the enemy fired its massive stream through the air and up into space. S
he had seen the dropship get blown apart, the rear carrier opening up and spilling its contents to the south of her. She had watched the mechs plummet from the hold towards the forest below.
It was Mitchell. She didn't know how she knew, but she did. He had come back to the planet. He had brought back the ship.
If she could have wrapped her hands around his neck and rung it, she would have. Of all the stupid things the egotistical jockey could have done, trying to save her was the dumbest of them.
She still didn't remember it. Not all of it. She knew she had seen the Goliath before. It had been different then. Simpler. It would never have been able to withstand a plasma stream in its original configuration. It had changed. They had changed it.
"Major Christine Arapo," she said to herself, for the thousandth time in the hours following the action. "I'm Major Christine Arapo."
She was. Wasn't she?
Something in her mind told her that her name was really Katherine.
And that didn't seem quite right either.
The ship. She had hoped never to see it again, even though she knew she had helped Mitchell escape so that he could find it. It would have been better if he had died. For him. For all of them.
There was nothing but pain and misery on board that ship. That was all it had ever carried. All that it had ever represented.
War. Endless war. Endless suffering.
She had brought it to him. No. That wasn't her. Was it? That was Katherine. She had brought the Goliath to save humankind from the enemy. Except it didn't. It couldn't. It never had. It wasn't enough. It was never enough.
Would it be different this time?
Could it?
She made her way to the edge of the rooftop and looked down. The soldiers had appeared when the Goliath had come, spilling out from abandoned apartments like ants. They must have been there the entire time, rotated in patrols but otherwise dormant. They stood at attention at nearly every street corner, their eyes looking blankly into the darkness, waiting for something to fight. Most weren't wearing exo, which was good.
She needed to get out of the city.
It was time.
She took note of their positions, capturing them in her mind and tracing a route around them that she hoped would get her a few blocks over without being seen. She had stashed the bike that she had used to escape from York in the back of a shop not far from her current location, thinking she might need it again.
Now that she did, she wished she didn't.
She held the rifle with the stock pressed against her shoulder, carrying it one-handed even though it would kill her aim. Then she moved back to the access stairs and began to descend.
The inside well echoed with her footsteps as she made her way down, quickly enough to reach the bottom in a reasonable amount of time, slowly enough that she wouldn't attract attention. She knew she was going to have to fight, but she wanted to get as close as she could without confrontation.
She slipped out through the rear delivery bay, using the rifle to leverage the door open just enough for her to crawl under. Once on the other side, she grabbed the rifle and rolled to her feet, raising it in both arms and spinning in a tight circle.
She was out.
She ran down the alley to the front of the building, checking the soldiers stationed there. They hadn't moved. Not a single step, not a single twitch. She passed silently behind them, her eyes sweeping back and forth while she crossed the street, waiting for any sign of recognition or motion.
She reached the corner. There were five soldiers on the other side of the street, facing south. She ducked down behind an abandoned vehicle with broken windows, picking up a piece of cracked carbonate. She threw it back the way she had come, and when it clattered on the ground, and the squad turned towards the noise, she dashed ahead of them and into another alley. She crossed that one, too, coming out on the other side, clearing a third group, and passing to the next block.
The shop and the bike were two more blocks away.
Something exploded to her right.
It was close. So close. She raised her arms instinctively to shield her face as the force of the blast knocked her down. The soldiers were alert now, and they saw the fire and began to whirl around in search of the cause.
Christine stayed on her knees, leveling the rifle at the group. Before she had a chance to pull the trigger, the entire squad vanished in a spray of chaingun fire.
She heard shouting, and then a car came around the corner. It was missing its roof, the gun salvaged from a mech and mounted to it on a makeshift tripod. One man drove, two more guided the weapon, angling it ahead of them and firing with abandon. The magazine uncoiled from somewhere in the back of the car, snaking up into the weapon, shells casting out and clanging in the street.
As the car passed, one of the gunner's heads turned and looked at her.
Then they were gone.
Another explosion echoed in the night. More gunfire, now joined by the familiar patter of standard rifles. She had known the rebels were out there, somewhere. Now they were trying to take back Angeles?
She got to her feet, standing in the street framed in the fire started by the rebel's timed explosive. She put her hand to her cheek, feeling the slick of blood there, and the edge of carbonate that had stabbed into her. She cursed and grabbed it, pulling it out and dropping it before turning and running.
They were fighting back. Had they been emboldened by the arrival of the dropship? Had they not seen it crash? It didn't matter if they killed every soldier in the city. There would be double the number in the morning, possibly reinforced with mechs.
She crossed the remaining streets to the shop, climbing through the slagged remains of the front, bypassing the mess of clothing that lay scattered along the floor. She reached the back and hit the release to open one of the changing rooms. The bike was waiting inside, tilted up on its front repulsor to make it fit in the space.
It was suicide to try to reclaim the city.
Then again, maybe suicide was the best option.
Goliath had come. The future had caught up to them again.
She wasn't sure exactly what that meant. It was a feeling more than a solid shape of understanding, a confusion of emotions that swirled and shifted and blended in a chaotic anti-pattern whose result made one thing clear:
She had to find Captain Mitchell Williams.
She had to kill him.
She slung the rifle over her shoulder and stepped forward, reaching out to grab the end of the bike and pull it into position to ride.
A single pop from behind and everything went black.
29
They heard the gunfire and explosions, even from their position over a hundred kilometers from Angeles. It echoed across the sky, screamed through the never-ending lines of trees and brush, and found them grouped together more tightly, taking a two-hour break to sleep.
Sleep was for the rest of the Riggers. Not for Mitchell. Someone had to stand guard, and as a former member of Greylock he was used to going days at a time without. The chemical stores implanted in his buttocks helped with that, pumping synthetic hormones and amphetamines into his system and keeping him up and alert long after he should have collapsed.
His record was nine days. There had been a Sergeant in Greylock before he joined the Company who had done fourteen. The story was that he saved the lives of his squad by keeping them fresh, even though it had driven him mad, and he had died not long after.
Everyone woke the moment the fighting started. Shank dropped to his knees, the Tactical in his grip, his eyes closed and using the interface with the scope. Cormac had been leaning against a tree, and he came upright and increased the power to his suit. Zed's mech twitched.
"What the hell?" Sergeant Kowalski growled. "Where is that coming from?"
"It's hard to tell out here," Mitchell said. "P-rat says Angeles."
"Angeles? Who's out there to fight?"
"It could be Raven or Perseus," Zed sai
d.
"Or the rebels," Cormac said. "Sir, we need to help them."
Of course, Mitchell wanted to. If Christine were in Angeles, she would be right in the middle of it. "We're a hundred klicks out, Firedog. That's over three hours at top running speed for the mechs, and we can't run in all of this cover. Whoever it is, they're on their own."
They were silent for a minute, listening to the distant sounds of the battle.
"Christ, we can't just sit here, sir," Cormac said.
"What do you want us to do, Firedog?" Shank asked. "We're too damn far away. If they'd waited until tomorrow night to start the party, I'd love to crash it."
"Me too," Mitchell said. He was silent for a moment, considering their options.
After the revelation about the factories, the Riggers had moved from a light jog to a stiff run, a tiring pace that had to be wearing out the foot soldiers even if they would never complain. It was less physically tiring to steer the mech, but more mentally demanding, especially as they had to navigate the big humanoids through the trees. He wasn't feeling it because of chemicals. What about Zed?
"Sir, I don't want to stand here while people are dying," Kowalski said.
"Me either, sir," Zed said.
He smiled. They were making it easy for him. "Okay. Let's move. Zed, take point, get up to the edge of our comm range."
"I should be out in front, sir," Shank said.
"I want you covering the rear. If the enemy is going to send reinforcements, they're going to come up from the agri-factories and over from York. We need to know as soon as possible if we're about to get it in the ass."
"Yes, sir."
