by Isaac Hooke
“It’s the perfect time,” I said, echoing my earlier thoughts. “Might as well get it off your chest before the real fighting begins.”
“Maybe,” Tahoe said. “Still, I feel like such a hypocrite for what I said earlier about love and married life. Who am I to talk, when I almost messed up my own marriage?”
“But you didn’t, Tahoe, did you? You’re still married.”
He nodded. “That I am.”
We passed the sealed doors of hangar bay three; the hangar had suffered damage during the previous battle and was still under repair. We opened and closed the airtight hatches of hangar bay four beside it and ran underneath the F-35 Avenger class starfighters before reaching another set of hatches in the rightmost bulkhead. Beyond it, we cut through a group of enlisted soldiers who were lined up outside the Ford’s sole tobacco shop—a popular spot, with a twenty-four seven queue. In the next corridor I caught a glimpse of Manic far ahead, where he trailed the main platoon body.
“By the way, how are you holding up?” Tahoe said, panting slightly.
“Fine,” I said cautiously.
“I saw your eyes back there,” Tahoe insisted. “When Hijak mentioned vengeance. I could see the guilt written all over your face.”
I sighed. “Can’t hide anything from you, can I bro?”
Tahoe chuckled. “I’m using my spirit world powers.”
“Yes. Powers you don’t believe in.”
“Just because I don’t believe in them doesn’t mean they don’t work,” he said.
“Navajo intuition. Nothing beats it.”
“Damn right.” Tahoe grinned, then became serious. “So truthfully, how are you holding up?”
I smiled wistfully. “Really, I’m fine. Sure, there’s some latent guilt over what I did. But that’s to be expected, isn’t it?”
“Depends on what you did,” Tahoe said. “Not that I want to know,” he added hastily.
“I’m sure you’ve already guessed.”
“Maybe. Maybe not.”
I decided to tell him and get it off my chest. “I was interrogated on that ship by the Guide’s slaves. By Lana actually. I—”
“Stop,” Tahoe said. “I told you, I don’t want to know.”
“But I have to tell you, Tahoe.” I slowed my pace, coming to a halt. “I have no one else I can talk to.”
Tahoe stopped beside me. “Where’s a stripper when you need her?”
I had to laugh at that. “I wonder what happened to Misty?”
“I’m sure she’s still waiting for you in Gliese 581.”
I looked at him pensively. If I was going to tell him about my capture, I had to do it before I changed my mind. “I gave up my embedded ID password, Tahoe. They tortured me and I gave it up. I thought I was stronger than that. Because of all the training I went through, training that taught me I was invincible.” I shook my head. There was that false word again. Invincible. I closed my eyes. “I really thought, despite all the warnings about interrogation, that I was different somehow. Unbreakable . . .”
Tahoe didn’t say anything. He didn’t have to. We started running again and he jogged along with me in silence. That was enough.
I felt the burning in my muscles, my lungs, my throat. I listened to the beating of my heart, the raggedness of my breath. I was alive and that’s all that mattered.
We opened and closed an airtight hatch and proceeded into a scuttle. When we reached the top and closed another hatch behind us, we jogged on. Glancing at the HUD map that my Implant projected onto my vision, I saw that the rest of the platoon was only a few corridors ahead. They’d probably taunt us for falling behind. That was fine: we dished it out as good as we got.
“You know why the Brass is separating the two of us, don’t you?” Tahoe said.
I shrugged. “They want to distribute our skill sets among the two squads.”
“That’s the official explanation,” Tahoe said. “But the real reason is Facehopper wants us apart.”
I felt my brow furrow. “Whatever for?”
“You remember that little disagreement him and I had during Crimson Pipeline?”
During the end of Operation Crimson Pipeline, Facehopper had ordered me to stay behind in an ATLAS 5 to guard the retreat, while instructing Tahoe and the rest of the platoon to return to the drop craft. Tahoe had refused, and wound up scuffling with our leading petty officer. It was one of the most blatant acts of insubordination I’d seen. Also one of the most touching.
While the two of them hadn’t been on the best of terms since then, it seemed unlikely that Facehopper had handpicked the squads. That was the domain of the Chief and the Lieutenant Commander.
“I don’t think Facehopper had anything to do with it,” I said.
“It’s true,” Tahoe insisted. “He has the Chief’s ear. And the skipper’s. He thinks we’re trouble together. Which isn’t far from the truth. He knows you’re one of the few I’d disobey a direct order for. And the Brass can’t have that. No sir. They need us to be obedient little grunts. For the most part I don’t mind. I like orders. I like the regimented life, and not having to think too much about whether what I’m doing is right or wrong. Just following orders like a true yes man. But if I’m given an order that puts my closest friends in danger, I’ll always have a hard time following it.”
I nodded slowly. I didn’t want to encourage him but in all honesty I felt much the same way about him and the rest of my brothers.
“Facehopper knows we hopped the border into the UC together,” Tahoe continued. “Knows we went through training together. Knows there’s a bond between us stronger than any in the brotherhood. And yet he’s breaking us apart. It’s a shame.” He pulled up short. “You’re the closest thing to a real brother I’ve ever had. I’ll miss you, bro.” He gave me a sudden hug.
“Tahoe—”
He moved away and raised his hands defensively. “I meant that in the most brotherly way possible, of course.”
I grinned. “You don’t have to explain. I’ll miss you too, brother. I truly will. I only wish . . .”
“What?”
I looked away. “Nothing.” I wish Shaw and Alejandro were here.
We reached the berthing compartment, where the rest of the platoon members were making their farewells. I’d be continuing onward with Outrigger, toward hangar bay seven, leaving half the platoon, including Tahoe, behind.
I held out my hand to him. “I’ll see you when this is done.”
Tahoe clasped my palm. He couldn’t talk. There were tears in his eyes, as if he felt this was the last time we’d ever see each other.
I refused to believe that.
I squeezed his hand tighter. “We’ll make it through this, Tahoe.”
He nodded quickly, turning away. “Give ’em hell, Rade,” he managed.
I wanted to tell him the same thing, wanted to give him some last words of encouragement, but I was choking up, too. I didn’t want him to see me in this moment—me, this big tough MOTH, breaking down in tears. So instead I turned away gruffly and started the jog to the hangar seven deck, not daring to say good-bye to anyone else.
Give ’em hell, Tahoe.
CHAPTER TWO
Tahoe
I was back on the moon where I’d nearly lost everything, about to put it all at risk again.
I felt strangely happy about that.
I suppose it came down to the fact that, at the end of the day, I enjoyed being out on spec-ops missions. I never felt as truly alive, as truly needed, as when I was on deployment. Sure, the fam needed me. The wife, the kids. And I loved them. But my brothers needed me, too, more than anything. As did humanity. If we failed, who could say what systems would fall next? To lose meant that there would be no family, no home, to go back to.
This mission was what being on the Teams was all about. I just felt sorry for
the poor son-of-a-bitches in our sister platoon, Bravo, who were forced to sit on their haunches while the rest of us were divvied up and set to work.
I had bitched to Rade about being split up from him, mostly because I wanted to be the one guarding his back. That was a selfish reason if there ever was one, because the truth was, he didn’t need me—he had seven of my brothers watching him. Just as I had seven more watching me. Rade and I were in good hands. I knew the men with us would go to the gates of hell and beyond to save our sorry asses if they had to.
The gates of hell. Not that I believed in that or anything. I came from an astrophysics background and it was terribly hard to give credence to a heaven, hell, or spirit world when you were aware of the immutability of math and physics. Still, I’d almost reversed my stance recently. Fighting alien entities that seemed little more than supernatural mists would make anyone believe in spirits and the afterlife. As would watching friends die.
And almost dying myself.
I never told Rade, but after he and Hijak had been captured and carried away for interrogation by the Guide, I experienced my closest brush with death yet. I was already shot up real bad by the time Rade vanished, but when the Chief led the rest of us in frantic flight from Shangde City, I was hit by another bullet and lost consciousness.
I found myself in a group of Wind Walkers, seated in a circle. Around us, as far I could see, perched other Wind Walkers in similar circles. Domes of white light encased each group, and from each individual, a different colored beam of light shot upwards into the sky.
Alejandro was one of the Wind Walkers in my group. As were my parents and grandparents. In the other circles I saw my ancestors seated among elders and medicine men. Some appeared in the guise of various animals. The fox. The rabbit. The horse. They were singing softly and the words comforted me.
Alejandro and I talked, laughed, and exchanged friendly jibes like in old times. But most important of all, he forgave me for letting him die.
“I chose to sacrifice myself that day, Tahoe,” he said. “To save you and Rade. Always remember that. It was my choice.”
“But there had to have been something more I could have done,” I said. “At the very least, avenging your death. But instead I ran. Like a coward.”
“Caramba,” Alejandro said. “You’re almost as bad as Rade. I wanted you to run. There was nothing you could do. If you had stayed, you would have died.”
I protested further but he brought me around to his point of view. He was always good at that. I still felt guilty over his death but the words helped.
We spoke of serious matters thereafter, like the need to remain positive even when all seemed lost, and the need to protect our brothers and our homeworld. The galaxy itself was at risk, Alejandro told me. The enemy would destroy everything if left unchecked, even the spirit world.
The Wind Walkers ended their song and began getting up and leaving. Alejandro rose, too, and I stood to join him.
“No,” Alejandro told me. “Go back, Tahoe Eaglehide. Rade needs you. Your brothers need you. Go back.”
He became a white buffalo, as did the other Wind Walkers, and the herd thundered away across the plain.
Feeling great sorrow at leaving them, I turned back, eventually waking up to find myself in intensive care.
I never really believed all the stories I had heard about near death experiences. But what I saw that day wasn’t something I could entirely explain with math and physics, or something I could forget. I told myself it was merely the delusions of an oxygen-deprived brain. But was it really?
“Cyclone, you there bro?” Ghost’s voice came over the comm, speaking my callsign.
I’d slowed my pace right down, I realized. I was at the rear of the squad in my mech, ahead of Ghost, who acted as our drag man. I was supposed to remain ten meters ahead of him, but according to my HUD his ATLAS 5 stood right behind me, while the next mech in the squad, Mauler’s, was about thirty meters forward.
“Sorry,” I returned. “Zoned out.”
“Hurry up or we’re going to leave signal range,” Ghost sent. The built-in network repeaters only worked so far in this heavy interference, and I had put enough distance between myself and Mauler for that to be a problem.
“What’s going on back there?” Facehopper transmitted, his voice clicking with static. “Cyclone, Ghost, keep up with the bloody squad, mates.”
“Sorry boss, Cyclone had to take a piss,” Ghost joked.
Cursing my sudden inattentiveness, I hurried forward, quickly resuming my position ten meters behind Mauler.
The black smooth walls of the cave around us were lit only by the headlamps of our mechs. We were deep within the warrens beneath Shangde City and had reached the area via the huge sinkhole cut into the open-air hydroponics station outside the city. We’d used the maps provided by Bravo platoon to take the quickest route to the unexplored sections, which lay just ahead.
So far we had encountered no signs of the enemy. The surface-side attack by the Marines had apparently drawn most, if not all, of the horde to the city above, leaving the caverns devoid of life. However, even if we encountered slugs, crabs, Phants, or other alien life, allegedly it wouldn’t matter—the EM emitters the Brass had embedded in our jumpsuits were supposed to fool the enemy into believing we were on the same side.
We all piloted ATLAS 5s. Body-encompassing, humanoid-shaped war machines that stood twelve meters high. Over a thousand hydraulically actuated joints. Onboard hydraulic pump and thermal management. Crash protection. Jumpjets. Head-mounted sensor package with built-in LIDAR, night vision, flash vision, zoom, and other augmented reality perception boosts that smoothly integrated with our helmet aReals. The mounts on the forearms held three weapons each: Gatlings, serpent missiles, and incendiary throwers. A hot-deployable ballistic shield on the left arm assembly offered protection against armor-piercing bullets.
The actuators of my ATLAS 5—callsign Wolfhound—enveloped my jumpsuit like a cocoon, and because my Implant was deactivated to protect against the infamous EM attacks of the Phants, with each step I could feel the slight resistance of those actuators. It was a feeling that registered only on the periphery of my consciousness and I often forgot I was inside a mech. So readily was my brain fooled by the sights, sounds, and tactile feedback provided by the inner cocoon that for all intents and purposes I was the ATLAS 5.
The squad brought with it two high-yield nuclear warheads. One ATLAS mech ported each payload and by doing so sacrificed its ability to use weapons and shields, as the portage required both arms. Even though the pilots wouldn’t directly experience the weight of the warhead, the load stress placed on the joints and servomotors of each ATLAS was mirrored by the internal cocoon. This imparted the illusion that the pilot carried a moderately heavy weight. The whole point of the load mirroring was to prevent pilots from overtaxing their ATLAS 5s. As such, carrying the warheads proved tiring to the operators and we were forced to swap out. Fret and Mauler were the lucky ones this time round.
“The first thing I’m going to do when I get back is order myself a nice, juicy cheeseburger,” Ghost sent directly to my aReal, apparently worried I would zone out again. “Slathered in melted cheese topped with caramelized onions. Some mayo, too, and a generous helping of Dijon mustard, along with fresh arugula leaves. Plus a dill pickle, sliced into three pieces. Oh, and we can’t forget the bun. It’s gotta be brushed with butter and toasted on the grill.”
“You’re just as bad as Lui,” I said over the comm. “All you can think about while on deployment is food.”
“You’re forgetting about sex,” Ghost sent. “Food and sex. The only things on my mind.”
“Great,” I muttered sarcastically.
“Food and sex are the flavors of life. They’re what being human is all about. And they’re the two things we can’t have on deployment. So of course I’m going to think about
them.”
“Chug down an MRE or something.” Meal, Ready-to-Eat.
Ghost laughed over the comm. “Don’t even get me started on MREs. Those, my friend, definitely don’t count as food. Sustenance, perhaps. Food, no.”
“Maybe you should invent a cheeseburger-flavored MRE.”
“Already been done,” Ghost sent. “Tastes like shit in a tire.”
I snickered. “Why am I not surprised you know what shit in a tire tastes like?”
“You laugh,” Ghost sent. “But back when I was training, the instructors made us lug tires through the bay beside the New Coronado sewage outlet. You quickly learned to keep your mouth shut.”
“Too bad the lesson was lost on you,” I muttered.
Ghost got the hint and kept the comm clear.
“We’re passing into the unmapped portion of the warren,” TJ announced a short time later.
I glanced at my HUD. We had indeed reached the great unexplored unknown. Ahead of our position, the map was a mass of pure black; a new tunnel slowly filled out as our two Centurion scouts advanced. The combat robots were equipped with the Phant-mimicking EM emitters, like us.
I trudged onward, and though I tried to keep my mind clear, my thoughts drifted to my last conversation with Rade. I’d owned up to almost cheating on Tepin. I felt so ashamed. I shouldn’t have told him, though, I had to admit, getting it off my chest did make me feel better. Better him than the crackpot shrink assigned to our unit.
I was a married man, a father, in the military. I never realized what a guilt-trip that could be sometimes. It was a funny thing, watching your kids grow up from afar. Via pictures. Vids. Sound bites.
“Say hello to your daddy, sweetie,” Tepin had said in the last message I’d received.
“Hello daddy.” My daughter Aniidastehdo waved at the camera.
Aniidastehdo. Her name meant “fresh start.” It was supposed to symbolize the chance our family had to start over in a new country. I remember the day she was born like yesterday: I’d just completed Fourth Phase of my training and was well on my way to becoming a MOTH. I was sending monthly deposits home to the wife. My CO at the time, Chief Adams, was in the process of arranging a residency for her and my daughter. We’d finally escaped the poverty and were about to embark on a new phase of life.
