by Isaac Hooke
Rade sighed mentally. Perhaps it had been a bad idea to let Tahoe come along with the squad after all, just not for the reasons the chief had originally thought.
He glanced at Keelhaul, who was still holding the comm node. Rade considered assigning him the task of returning that comm node, but he wanted experienced mech pilots in case events took a turn for the worse back there. So he chose the specialists.
“Bomb and Lui,” Rade said. “Secure the comm node and carry it back to Gray Gate. Take four of the Centurions with you, and two HS3s to act as advance scouts.”
“You got it, boss,” Lui responded.
“Thank you,” Tahoe transmitted.
Rade considered sending another mech with Bomb and Lui, but he would very likely need all the Hoplites he could muster if he wanted to continue pursuing Vicks into that uncharted jungle.
In moments Bomb and Lui were gone. Rade glanced at his overhead map and saw the lieutenant’s dot continuing to move away eastward, pursued by the lagging HS3s, and the Centurions beyond them. Her dot flickered occasionally as the signal strength weakened.
“The rest of you,” Rade said. “We have a hostage to rescue. Resume traveling overwatch. Fast jog.”
sixteen
Rade and his reduced squad advanced at a slow jog through that thick, pitch-black jungle. He had given up the zig zag distribution, as well as the traveling overwatch formation; instead the squad moved forward in single file. At least that way, the route proved easier for those who resided in the latter portion of the line. Foliage still constantly whipped at their hulls no matter their position in the queue of course. There wasn’t a moment when branches ceased to snag and sap them.
Even with the autopilot enabled, at first the Hoplites routinely tripped and fell—especially those in the front sections. But then Rade had TJ, who was on point, reduce his pace, and that helped them circumvent the more difficult topography. Even so their advance proved incredibly noisy, at least compared to their earlier, stealthier progression. Any creatures slumbering nearby in that alien jungle were likely wide awake by then, and watching from the shadows.
Rade half-expected an ambush to occur at any moment. If the hammerheads came, the squad would be hard pressed to fight its way out alive. Rade had a vague plan to take to the treetops in such a scenario, perhaps utilizing the jumpjets to break through the canopy, but he had doubts about the ability of the Hoplites to avoid being snagged by the upper branches. In fact, it was very likely the mechs wouldn’t be able to break through at all, which was why he hadn’t ordered the platoon to do that very thing in the pursuit of Vicks. There was another wrinkle, too: given the speed with which the unknown captors were moving away, even if he and the others managed to break through the overhead canopy, the Hoplites would run out of jumpjet fuel before they even got close.
A long thirty-five minutes later Bomb and Lui reported in. Their signal strength proved very low, and it took a few transmission attempts before Rade understood what they were trying to tell him: they had departed the jungle without incident.
Rade received a message from Facehopper shortly thereafter. “Rage... far enough. Only a little... no point... turn back when... lieutenant leaves signal range.”
“Roger that,” Rade sent. “We’ll turn back as soon as Lieutenant Vicks moves beyond signal range.”
The flickering indicators of Bomb and Lui blinked out on the plains a few moments later, halfway to the rock formation. The blue dots representing the rest of the platoon back at Gray Gate also vanished.
“On our own now, boys,” TJ said.
“It feels so... isolating, somehow,” Manic commented. “Stranded on an alien world, in a forest teeming with unseen enemies, cut off from the only brothers we have.”
“We have each other,” Rade said. “The only brothers we’ll ever need.”
Rade continued the advance for fifteen more minutes. On the overhead map, the lieutenant’s indicator moved farther and farther away.
As her winking dot threatened to leave signal range, vanishing from the display more often than it remained, Tahoe stirred to life.
“Come on, pick up the pace people!” Tahoe said. “We’re going to lose her!”
“It won’t matter, Tahoe,” Rade said.
“They’ll have to stop eventually,” Tahoe said. “They’re taking her to some base. Isn’t it obvious?”
“Not really,” Manic said.
“We should turn back,” TJ said. “It’s obvious we’re not going to catch her now.”
Rade hesitated. He was intending to do that very thing, but if he gave the order at that precise moment, it would seem like he was listening to TJ. Rade cursed inwardly.
You’re their leader. Make the choice. Forget about outward appearances and do the right thing.
“Full stop, people,” Rade said. “TJ’s right, there’s nothing more we can do.”
“But we can’t just give her up,” Tahoe said.
“Cyclone, I feel the sting more than any of us, believe me,” Rade said. “She was my charge. But I can’t justify continuing the pursuit. She’s going to be out of range in seconds. There’s no point in continuing.”
“I can track her without a signal,” Tahoe said. “I can read the trees. I learned how to track when I was a child growing up on the reserve.”
“That’ll take a long time,” Rade said. “We’re already cut off, too far away from our platoon. It’s dark now, and while I’m sure we’ve awakened many jungle creatures with our passage, most of the remainder are sleeping. But what happens in the morning? Will we find ourselves stranded in the middle of the jungle, surrounded by a thousand fully awake hammerheads waiting to tear our mechs apart, hungry to get at the fresh tuna inside the tins of our mechs?”
“Did you just compare us to tuna?” Manic asked.
“Unfortunately, yes,” Rade said. “I blame that one on Bender.”
“But we don’t know what they’re going to do to her!” Tahoe insisted. “Torture her, if they’re SKs. And if they’re alien... dissect her. Alive.”
“I’m sorry,” Rade said. “The chief already gave me a direct order. We turn back when she leaves signal range.”
“Do you remember when we were in boot camp?” Tahoe said, his voice becoming urgent. He reminded Rade of a drowning man grasping frantically for anything to hold on to. “We had a mantra then, one that we followed to the letter. No one gets left behind. That mantra defined us. Made us who we are today. We wouldn’t have made it through MOTH training without it.”
“Cyclone, we’re turning back,” Rade turned his mech around. “TJ, recall the HS3s and the Centurions.”
“You’re turning back,” Tahoe said. “But I’m moving forward. No one gets left behind.”
“What’s she to you, anyway?” TJ said. “I thought you were a happily married man.”
“I am,” Tahoe said. “She’s a friend. And I don’t leave friends behind.”
“We don’t have time for this childish behavior, Cyclone,” Rade said, purposely emphasizing the callsign, wanting to remind Tahoe that he was speaking as his commanding officer at the moment, not his friend.
“Court martial me,” Tahoe said, shoving past him to continue through the trees.
Rade leaped onto his Hoplite, pinning Tahoe against a tree. “Can’t let you do it.”
Tahoe swung his mech to the side with a sudden unexpected force and launched his arm outward. Rade hurtled backward into Manic’s Hoplite, knocking it down.
“Hey!” Manic transmitted.
Rade got right back up and threw himself on Tahoe, who had turned his back on him to continue into the jungle. He attempted to subdue him by bringing the arms of the Hoplite behind its back, but Tahoe fired ventral thrust, rocketing the two of them upward.
Rade slammed into a thick overhead branch, arresting the jump, and the two of them tumbled back to the jungle floor, where they wrestled.
Tahoe thrust repeatedly at Rade’s torso, aiming for the head section
. His fist struck a glancing blow to one of the cameras embedded in Rade’s torso; when that fist withdrew for the next strike, Rade swiveled, wanting to spare the camera. He received a nice dent in the side of his mech instead.
Another Hoplite intervened. “That’s enough, boys,” Keelhaul said, pulling Tahoe’s mech off of him.
Tahoe spun and punched Keelhaul in the chest area, sending his mech sliding backward across the forest floor.
“It certainly is.” Rade quickly pulled up the override controls on Tahoe’s mech, and proceeded to lock him out.
Tahoe had forewarning, however. He must have sensed the giveaway stiffening of the limbs momentarily before all control was lost, because he managed to open his cockpit. He flew upward into the trees in his jumpsuit.
“Damn it.” Rade jettisoned from his cockpit, too, loathe to send his mech up there. It would be too easy to hurt Tahoe with his Hoplite, not to mention an extravagant waste of mech fuel.
He spotted Tahoe’s dark form on the LIDAR and thermal band, leaping from branch to branch, continuing toward Vicks. Rade tried to disable the jumpsuit, too, but Tahoe had some sort of failsafe in place.
With a sigh, Rade leaped into the air and thrust after him. Small branches broke away as he struck them, others whipped at the fabric of his suit so hard that he felt their impacts on his flesh underneath. His arm snagged on a branch, pulling him toward a tree. As he compensated with lateral thrust, he accidentally smashed into a bigger branch along the way, and it left a large circular crack in his faceplate.
“Shit.”
He landed on a thick bough and raced forward, leaping toward Tahoe, who was in midair ahead of him. Rade hurtled into his friend and wrapped his arms around the waist area, and the pair landed on a wide branch just below.
“Obey my goddamn orders,” Rade said, pinning him there. He reached around, gripped the feed to Tahoe’s jumpjet, and ripped it away. “I’ve granted you lenience, more than any other man serving under me. Given you special treatment. Chauffeured you to and from the base in my personal vehicle. Allowed you to go home early every second Friday. Approved all your holidays no questions asked. Well, all of that’s going to stop! No more special treatment. None! You’re just another MOTH serving under me.” He paused, panting. “Now. Are you going to stop struggling, dammit?”
He waited, but Tahoe said nothing. Rade couldn’t see his face in the dim light of course; the LIDAR and thermal vision represented his faceplate as a smooth, black surface.
Rade interpreted Tahoe’s lack of response as a yes and he sat up straighter. He was about to loosen his hold when all of a sudden Tahoe punched Rade underneath the helmet, hard, jerking his neck painfully backward.
Before Rade knew what happened, Tahoe managed to flip him over so that he was the one on top, with Rade pinned underneath.
Rade glanced to one side. He lay at the very edge of the thick branch, and there was only empty space beside him: if he fell, it would be a long way to the forest floor.
Rade struggled to get up. His arms were pinned to his sides.
Tahoe’s gloved fists came in, repeatedly striking the faceplate. Rade’s head ricocheted inside the helmet.
“I never wanted any of your damn special treatment!” Tahoe sounded like he was crying in his suit as he pounded away.
The crack in Rade’s faceplate widened under the blows. He continued to struggle, but he couldn’t get his arms free. He began to feel slightly nauseous, no doubt because of the way his head was bouncing around inside the helmet.
“You were my friend!” Tahoe continued. “My best friend. But then you became LPO. All of a sudden, it was like I didn’t know you anymore. You became so goddamn full of yourself. Strutting around like some self-important prick. We stopped hanging together on weekends. We stopped working out together. And when you deigned to talk to me at all, it felt like you were implying I was lucky you made the time for a lowly petty officer like me at all. You never gave me special treatment. Not once. No more than anyone else anyway. You punished me, damn it. Starved me for hazing the Artificial, when the whole platoon was involved. You singled me out just to prove I wasn’t your friend anymore. Well you know what, Rade Galaal? Fuck you!”
Tahoe abruptly stopped the assault. He sat up. The shoulder areas of his suit shook slightly, as if he wept.
Rade took a moment to recover from the blows.
“Is that how you felt?” Rade finally said. “I punished you, Tahoe, because I had to show the others I could punish a friend. Not because you weren’t my friend anymore. And I put Bender at half rations, too, in case you forgot.”
Tahoe didn’t answer.
Finally Tahoe got up, freeing him. He took several wobbly steps backward.
“Are you going to have me court martialed?” Tahoe asked
“No,” Rade said, standing himself. “In fact, I’m deleting the past few minutes from my Implant. Everyone else, do the same. This never happened, understood?”
“What never happened?” Manic said.
“Good,” Rade said. “I’m glad we understand each other.”
None of them were supposed to have the ability to alter their logs, but during downtime at the base TJ had found a bug that allowed him to escalate his privileges on his Implant, and he had shown them all how to do it.
“Now get back to your mech, Cyclone, so we can get the hell out of here.” Rade unlocked Tahoe’s mech.
Tahoe took a few uncertain steps backward, and then he summoned his Hoplite. The mech came to his side.
“Wait,” Rade said. “Turn around.”
Tahoe complied.
Rade reinserted the fuel feed into Tahoe’s jetpack, and secured it with tape from his utility belt. “Good to go.”
Tahoe leaped onto the arm of his mech without using his jetpack—likely he wanted to examine the feed on his own at some point to confirm the seal. Then he dove into the cockpit, which shut behind him.
Rade jetted toward his own mech. When the cockpit sealed behind him, he turned the Hoplite and prepared to begin the long return trek.
“She just stopped,” TJ announced.
“What?” Rade glanced at his HUD hesitantly. The lieutenant’s dot randomly flickered on and off, but as TJ had said, she had indeed stopped.
“She’s still within signal range...” Tahoe said. The hope was obvious in his voice. As was the imploration.
Rade lingered only a moment longer. “We continue the pursuit. Stealth advance, people. TJ, resume point. Have the HS3s and Centurions enter stealth mode, too.”
The mechs resumed their single file advance, but at a careful walk. They still made some noise, of course, but far less than previously.
“The HS3s have arrived at the perimeter of a camp of sorts beneath the trees,” TJ said.
“Halt them there,” Rade instructed. “But dispatch two of them outward along the perimeter. Let’s see if the HS3s can map out the full extents of that camp. When the Centurions arrive, have the combat robots split up to assume hides along that perimeter. Full stealth mode.”
“Aye, LPO,” TJ said. There was no hint of TJ’s earlier scorn. Maybe he was finally glad that Rade was the one in command and not him. Glad that Rade had to make the difficult decisions.
Rade switched to the video feed of one of the HS3s near the camp beneath the canopy. In the gloom, he discerned three geodesic domes placed amid the trees. Most of the undergrowth had been cleared around them. Near the larger dome, two of the ‘roach’ class mechs guarded a sealed airlock with their four-armed torsos. The lieutenant’s signal was coming from inside. Smaller scorpion mechs patrolled the grounds between the remaining domes. He counted fifteen mechs in total.
“It must have been one of the scorpion mechs that took her,” Manic said.
“Or a new type we haven’t seen before,” Skullcracker said. “Hidden somewhere out there.”
“Either way,” Rade said. “We have to act now. Like Cyclone said, we don’t know what they’re doing to her.” He
paused to consider his options. “All right. Here’s what’s going to happen. We’re going to advance at our slowest possible speed, full stealth mode, and halt roughly eighty meters from the perimeter.” Rade knew that was about as close as the Hoplites could get without alerting the inhabitants of the camp—even in full stealth mode, the ponderous machines made some noise. If there was less foliage, they might have been able to close to within twenty meters. But under the current circumstances, it was far too easy to snap a stray branch or crush a small shrub, and the resultant noise would readily reach the camp. He had based the eighty meter halting distance on the sound profile of the jungle as calculated by the HS3s. He just hoped the machines weren’t wrong.
“Once we’ve taken up that position,” Rade continued. “We’re going to have one of the HS3s stage a diversion on the far eastern side. It’s going to move into the camp, flash its lights and make a bunch of noise, then turn around and flee into the jungle. When the scorpions are drawn away, the rest of us will move in. We’ll engage any of the remaining mechs, including the two roaches at the airlock, who will presumably remain behind regardless of any diversion. We’ll draw them away, and while the rest of you keep them occupied, Cyclone and I will proceed to the geodesic dome alone. We’ll dismount, leaving our Hoplites to guard the entrance, then we’ll enter the airlock. We’ll rescue Vicks, if she’s still alive, and then get the hell out. With luck, we’ll be able to leave the camp before the rest of the scorpions return, or before any other reinforcements arrive.”
“You shouldn’t be the one to go,” TJ said. “Not as our LPO. And Cyclone is obviously too emotionally involved.”
Rade could hear Facehopper’s nagging voice in his head, reminding him of his duty.
He’s right. Send someone else. You’re LPO now. Start acting like one. Stay with your men. Lead them.
“She was my charge,” Rade said, trying to ignore that voice. “I should be the one to get her. But maybe you’re right about Cyclone.”
