by Hanks, Greg
“Draining the Vista is the only way?” asked Dodge. “I mean, couldn’t we just jam them from here?”
Celia shot Dodge a polluted look.
“Unfortunately, no,” answered Vane, using the interface module in his hand to control the spinning holograph. He zoomed in on the tunnel, expanding it to the size of the table itself. “However, this will be a simple mission. It has to be, or we lose our head start on Celement. Celia, if you would explain our objectives, please.”
Celia spoke from behind her see-through monitor, “We have four objectives. First, we need to make sure the emergency drain vents are not obstructed. There are four of them, located in the bottom corners of the tunnel.” She highlighted their positions, making them visible to us.
“Why would they be obstructed?” asked Dodge.
“Diagnoses show that there has been a malfunction on one of the valves. I am just saying we need to make sure. All surveillance has been shorted, so there’s no way for me to see what’s been going on in there.”
“Great,” droned Dodge.
“Our next objective—I guess I should say your next objective—is opening the main door to the Vista. Just make sure you take cover on either side of the door, unless you wanna go for a swim.” The neon yellow highlight embossed the back doors of the hologram.
“How much water’ll come out?” asked Vexin.
I hadn’t paid much attention to Vex, whose pale skin was bruised. Underneath his eye, a bandaged gash made me smile a little. That was my doing.
“Well,” said Celia, “imagine Central, full of water.”
Vexin looked dissatisfied.
Even though Vex was horribly rude and acidic, he was an incredible asset to the group. It took me a while to see it—and every ounce of patience—but Vexin was just as focused and adamant about Genesis’ goal than anyone else. At first, I hated him more than anything. He had verbally shattered me each time I trained with him. However, once I became comfortable around him, a certain connection began to grow. It was a porous, spiky bond, but a bond nonetheless.
“All right,” she continued, “your next objective is sealing off the breach. The emergency hull repair system managed to fix most of it, but there’s still a leak. You will have to physically place a patch from the inside. There will be a repair kit in the Vista.”
“Are our suits waterproof?” asked Tara.
“Of course,” replied Celia. “Finally, you will just have to turn on the emergency power systems. Once you’re in there, I’ll direct you to where they are. And . . . that’s it.” She smiled faintly from behind those thick glasses of hers.
“Are we clear?” asked Vane. I could tell how impatient he was. I hadn’t ever seen him this nervous. Celement must be worse than I thought.
Everyone nodded. We were ready.
“Just be careful, please,” Celia added, mostly directed at Dodge. “We still don’t know what caused this.”
“This one’s in the bag,” said Dodge, stretching and standing up. The rest of us got to our feet and the hologram disappeared.
After everyone was dismissed, we all found ourselves in the locker portion of the Armory. It was finally time to don our Oversuits. I was excited, having only seen Bollis do it once before. Maybe the mission could count as my last training session, before the final plunge. Thankfully, Simone’s fear extinction helped me fend off encroaching peril. No matter how many times the little demon in my head told me I only had a month’s training, I could approach the situation with a calm demeanor, fully focused.
“You two remember how this works?” Bollis asked Tara and me.
“I think so,” said Tara, placing all of the plating on the bench in front of her. She examined them, wondering where to start.
I first took out the sabatons. They were slim-fitting, following every curve of my foot, with a pointed toe and a tongue that curved up as it met the ankle. A thin piece of the material continued upwards, denoting the shin-plate.
Vexin lifted his leg upon the bench and began to assemble his armor.
I mimicked him and stepped into the boot’s skeleton.
A reactant inside my Undersuit activated micro magnets within the Oversuit material, and the boot clamped onto my foot and shin. Once the greave had connected, more layers fanned out, encasing the majority of my calf.
Next, were my cuisses, or thigh-plates. I held them up to the light, admiring the intricate Kevlar-metal design. Similarly, when I placed them upon my thighs, they locked into place and more layers surrounded the extremity.
I continued with the rest of my armor, placing them and watching the magnetic forces pull together and latch each plate with precision. My cuirass was thick and dense, wrapping around to my spine, while the vambrace and rerebrace allowed my arms full mobility. The last pieces were the pauldrons, securing my shoulders with a round sheet of protection. Once everything was in place, I felt invincible.
I clipped on a lumbar pouch—a grouping of three satchels that hung at my lower back. We used the pockets to hold ammunition, grenades, or other trinkets.
At last, I could wear the helmet. I plucked it from my locker and ran my gloved hand over the sleek visor. I was taken back to the night Bollis and I met, when I first laid eyes on the strange thing. It was indeed layered with flexible dragon scales. Each helmet was fitted to the shape of the user’s head, which required a split on each side of the cheek areas. The cracks would automatically come together once the helmet was worn. I stuffed the sphere underneath my arm and felt the little boy inside of me scream with excitement.
I glanced at Tara, who looked just as attractive as before. Her Oversuit was specifically designed for a woman, with changes in the armor to accommodate her figure. I thought back to our first encounter, seeing her in normal clothes. That was an entire dimension ago.
The Oversuit sported a pale, chalky color. Contrasted with the blackberry Undersuit, we looked sleek and robotic. Dodge, Vexin, and Bollis had yellow highlights and designs painted professionally upon different armor pieces.
With our suits calibrated and set, we were just getting started.
Our next destination was to grab our loadouts—our weapons of choice. Earlier, Dodge had mentioned that while everyone was trained to use all of the weapons, each person had their specialty. Bollis walked up to the rifle rack and snatched his short barreled, close quarters fashioned Electromagnetic Burst Rifle or “ELBR.” The sub-machine gun accommodated his demolitions forte. When he was arming charges or setting mines, he needed to make sure he could draw his weapon without having much room to do so. His range of explosives included plastics, remote and proximity mines, electro-grenades, and tiny projectiles called sliderjets.
Dodge was our marksman. He moved to the opposite side of the rifle pillar and grabbed his sleek, long-nosed M580. The M580 was a single shot, high-powered, long range rifle that could put a hole through two elephants standing side-by-side. It was meant for a dead eye—someone who only needed one shot. Dodge also specialized in our sniper rifle, the .60 caliber, armor piercing MR-F39 or as we called it, the “Ramrod.” I had only seen Dodge use it once, but when he did, nothing remained of the targets. The only thing keeping the user from being knocked down was a sophisticated damping mechanism that stopped overheating and restrained kick-back. The squared, heat-sensing scope could spot someone in incredible definition, two miles away.
Heavy weapons were Vexin’s tools. Weighing in at 60 pounds, the “Boomsocket” was our grenade launcher. It used three-inch, tennis ball-sized canisters, which detonated on impact. This was our deadliest defense, considering the destruction created when one of those shells made contact. Vexin was also savvy with my personal favorite, the RAV-77. With its long, v-shaped nose and 200-round barrel magazine, the heavy machine-gun could unload its entire clip in about 20 seconds. The recoil alone knocked me down onto my butt, but Vexin could use it while standing. The RAV-77 was truly a monster. Lastly, Vexin used his prized possession—the Stauss 4—a deadly shotgun, prep
ared with armor-piercing shells.
When it came down to Tara and me, we didn’t have specialties. We used the standard CT-46, an assault rifle with a three-round burst fire. It was equipped with a holographic sighting system and two, side-by-side 30-round clips. Everyone also came set with a bulky, electromagnetic handgun, and were all trained to use the RPG-88, a stocky rocket launcher, designed to fire quick, accurate explosives. Most of our rifles came standard with a four-inch suppressor and anti-personnel rounds.
Needless to say, we were ready to do some damage. When I learned about the difficulty of infiltrating GenoTec, I began to understand why all of these weapons were needed. Slate and Repik weren’t fooling around, and we had to be careful. Hopefully, we wouldn’t ever have to use most of it.
Each weapon came with unique magnets that corresponded with ones inside our Oversuits. Instead of having to deal with textile straps, weapons could be attached to our back or thighs, making drawing and holstering much more efficient.
Everyone started to filter out of the Armory, leaving Tara, Justin, and me alone. I wanted to talk with Tara, but the boy was still tagging along. If he didn’t leave, I was going to shoo him away. It might have been my last time to have the dreaded conversation.
“You guys are friggin’ lucky!” he said, tinkering with an unloaded pistol. “I don’t wanna be stuck wid Vaner and Tat girl. This blows.”
“I don’t know about lucky,” replied Tara, snapping her rifle to her back.
“You can do more damage from here, anyways,” I added.
“She doesn’t even let me do much,” he mumbled, still on about Celia.
“Well, why don’t you see if she needs help prepping,” I said, instantly letting Tara know I wanted to talk.
“Fine, you tooth-groins. But you owe me. I only came to the Underbed because I thought I’d be killin’ Tarmucks.”
Tara wasn’t looking at me. Her eyes were at the door, watching Justin leave. Why were we walking on eggshells? I waited until she turned around. She looked as if she were anticipating something.
“Tara . . .” I began, but felt really awkward all of the sudden. Just as I opened my mouth to finish, a voice blared above.
“Mark? Tara?” said Celia. “It’s too late to duck out now, just so you know.”
Perfect timing, damn it.
Both of us half-smiled at each other. I was glad we could at least see the humor.
“I promise we’ll have this conversation after,” Tara told me, and we left the Armory together.
So that was it. I could have easily been annoyed, but maybe it was best. There was a glimmer of hope at the end of this unnecessary tunnel.
When we met with the group, everyone was already wearing their helmets. Justin was standing with Celia and Vane on the pedestal, and the giant Vista doors were opened, revealing a small antechamber.
“The reason we’re doing this full force,” announced Vane, as Tara and I donned our helmets, “is for the simple matter of unity. This will tell us how well we can cooperate. That can make all the difference later on.”
Inside my helmet, everything looked vividly orange. Holographic charts and introductory phrases popped up on the corners of the visor as the helmet was configured. Each helmet was designed to provide a huge range of visibility. I could see fairly well in my peripheral vision and didn’t feel suffocated or trapped. The electronic interface let me know how many bullets I had left, where damaged portions of my suit were, and anything else Celia wanted to insert.
For the last five minutes, we ran over how the operation was going to work. If we had the resources and the time, I’m sure training and planning for specific missions would be week-long at the least. But we were renegades, being chased by GenoTec. We weren’t allowed the precious time needed to meticulously plan out an operation. Especially now, with Celement trailing us.
Once the short briefing finished, Vane sighed and said, “Good luck.”
The five of us grouped together inside the small, concrete cubicle, breathing heavily and feeling strong. I flexed my fingers in and out, stretched my neck, and double-checked everything.
“Four clips, Vexin?” poked Dodge, mocking Vexin’s over-preparation.
Vexin produced a conceited laugh and said, “You’ll be wishing I saved your ass when you run out of ammo.”
Dodge snickered and Bollis interjected, “Technically, we don’t know what’s in there.”
“Oh, c’mon,” said Dodge nonchalantly, “whatever broke through is either dead or gone by now. Let’s just finish this as fast as we can—I’m runnin’ on no sleep here, folks.”
I said nothing as the giant doors behind us closed, starting the fuse to my first live mission.
36
“Decontamination in progress,” said a clean, familiar female voice. Aiya was trolling along as usual. Everyone was taut and unnerved while the room became free from any foreign agents. A whoosh of air enveloped our bodies and a low humming sound processed its way throughout the room. As the procedure finished, I thought about Tara and wondered what she was feeling right now.
“Watch your step,” said Aiya, “and have a safe travel to the Corrupt Vista.”
The large door opened in a mirage of scintillating lights. The tunnel’s high, arching ceiling and ribbed walls made me feel empty. The semicircular corridor stretched fifty yards, making the end muddled. Following the curvature of the concrete, fiber lamps twitched and buzzed in disarray. I felt liquid lap against my boots and watched as water poured into the cubicle.
“Well, here we go,” said Bollis, and we all waded our way out into the unknown. The water was ankle deep throughout the entire tunnel.
We split up to cover more ground. Dodge, Tara and I stayed back, securing the first two grates, while Vexin and Bollis started to splash their way down to the end of the tunnel.
“Okay, so the water damage isn’t as bad as I thought, that’s good,” said a startling Celia, probably watching all of this from someone’s visor.
“Nothing back here,” I said through my helmet. The grate looked clean and unobstructed. Dodge announced the same thing, so we followed the other two.
“What the—”
“What is that?” exclaimed Celia.
We ran the full length of the tunnel, reaching Bollis and Vexin, huddled around the left side grate.
Finally, we came to halt.
Ho-lee hell.
Behind my orange-tinted glass, my eyes focused on one of the strangest things I had ever seen. Latched and intertwined with the grate was a giant, pulsating mass of what looked like puce flesh. Slimy tentacles were choking the drainage system, rooted deep.
“I need a sample, now,” said Celia.
“It’s . . . it’s oozing,” said Tara.
“Why don’t you come down here and get a sample,” Dodge replied, disgusted.
“Look,” she demanded, “if I don’t get a sample, no one’s setting foot inside that Vista.”
“I’ve never seen anything like this before,” said Bollis, squatting and taking the sample. He used a small needle, taken from the cuff of his armor and stuck the unknown mass. He inserted the sample back into the sleeve and waited for Celia to get the readings.
It was quiet as we all examined the grotesque thing. It was porous, slowly draining greenish pus. I was glad our helmets were on, because it probably smelled like death.
“Celia, what’ve you got?” said Dodge, impatiently.
Celia cursed from the other side and said, “This thing’s got huge traces of Edge!”
Edge? What in the hell was Edge doing in something like this?
“Axxiol. It came from Axxiol,” said Vexin, unlatching his shotgun and pointing it at the mass. “Let’s get rid of it and move on.”
“Now wait a minute!” said Bollis, shoving Vexin’s barrel down. “There’s no way this thing came from Axxiol. How could something like this break through our hull?”
“Give me another explanation?” said Vexin, face to fac
e with Bollis.
“Just bring it back once you’ve finished. We’ll figure things out later,” said Celia, receiving terrible reviews on that idea. Nevertheless, Vexin raised his weapon again.
The pellets impaled the creature and splattered green ooze all over the watery floor below. A bunch of other bulbous substances escaped from the opening, covered in thin, transparent films along with a red liquid.
“We’ll have to cut it down,” said Vexin.
Most of the thing had been cleared away, leaving a stained metal vent, but there were still some attached tentacles, like unforgiving ivy.
We took turns cutting out the hardened stalks, using small combat knives. We had to remove the grate to manually clear out the infestation. Green, murky liquid was everywhere, along with barnacle-like obstructions and sticky debris. It was like cleaning out a sewage tank. Once we had physically fixed the drain, the water still didn’t budge.
“I guess that wasn’t the problem,” said Dodge, as we waited for Celia’s reassurance. But there was none.
“It has to recalibrate,” she said, pausing for a while.
“Well, we might as well move on then,” said Bollis. He moved toward the raised platform, to the entrance to the Vista, and started checking the interface unit to the left of the doors.
Tara and I replaced the grate and hurried to join Dodge up the stairs. Celia directed Bollis and Vexin how to manually power to door’s mechanism.
“You ready for this?” I asked Tara.
She nodded and said, “Definitely.”
I clutched my rifle, steadying my grip. Both of my clips were full. My body felt agile. I had clear purpose. As my shoulder leaned against the concrete wall, I realized that I had truly become a machine of war. Within a month, I had successfully been able to still my emotions, halter my reservations, and hone my skills as a warrior. If there were still a need for soldiers today, Simone would be the most coveted resource on the market. I wondered what I would be like if we had reached two months.
“All right,” said Vexin, his voice crystal clear through my helmet. “On the count of three.”
