by Isaac Hooke
More tunnels branched off, but we stuck to the main. The passage began to curve so that the remaining crab was often lost from sight behind us. The thing maintained its pursuit nonetheless. It continued to slowly fall back but only because the squad moved at its top speed. We couldn’t maintain that pace forever: servomotors would begin to overheat and hydraulic joints would start to lock up.
“Bomb, take the next side passage,” Facehopper sent. “Everyone, follow.”
As requested, Bomb turned into a smaller offshoot tunnel.
“When I give the word, shut off your headlamps, deactivate your emitters, and remain absolutely still,” Facehopper transmitted. “I want no sounds coming from any of your mechs.”
Ghost dove into the side tunnel after the others. The walls were tight here: if I wanted to, I could have touched the ceiling from my perch merely by lifting a gloved hand.
“Now!” Facehopper sent.
Even though the pursuing alien was likely blind, we all turned off our lights as Facehopper requested. Via the backlit display of my aReal, I also shut down the EM emitter in my jumpsuit, and then dimmed the screen.
Around me, all the mechs remained still, so that I heard only the nearby skittering of the crab and its occasional shrieks of outrage. That was the thing about ATLAS 5s. They were designed for silent running—when motionless, they produced almost no sound. For the spec-ops soldier, to whom stealth was a highly valued commodity, the advent of the silent mech was a game changer.
The absolute darkness proved unnerving. I switched to night-vision mode but still couldn’t see a thing. Instead of an all-consuming mass of black, a nondescript block of green filled my sight.
The scrape of claws against stone rose in volume as the supercrab approached our hiding place. Loud clicks issued from the opening as the alien reached our side passage, but the thing passed us right by. I guess I was wrong about it being able to sense the nuclear payload. Then again, maybe it had to approach within a certain distance to do so. Either way, we seemed to have avoided detection.
When the noise of the alien’s passage faded, we reactivated our headlamps and EM emitters.
“Remind me again why we couldn’t just kill the thing?” Bomb sent.
“We’ve attracted enough attention to ourselves as it is,” Facehopper returned.
TJ gazed down the side passage. “If the source coordinates are accurate, by continuing down this tunnel, we should reach the Observer Mind in two klicks. Assuming it’s not a dead end.”
I wasn’t sure whether to feel relieved or anxious. The Observer Mind, only two klicks ahead. Finally our target awaited. We could place the last nuclear and get the hell out of there.
“Mauler, send your ASS in,” Facehopper transmitted.
The drone revolved transversally, weaving past the ATLAS 5s. The scout’s light cone illuminated the rock in a clockwise manner as it proceeded down the tunnel.
I didn’t like how close those black walls seemed; the ATLAS 5s were already packed in there as it was. I almost suggested that we try a different route, but I doubted the other tunnels were any better.
“The interference is high in here,” Mauler transmitted. “Already I’m almost out of signal range. I’m setting the drone to autopilot, with instructions to return if it encounters any enemy resistance or a change in tunnel dynamics.”
“Good,” Facehopper sent. “Bomb, lead the way.”
We proceeded down the tunnel in single file. The already cramped rock slowly tightened, and my unease grew: it felt all too much like a closing noose. The squad members were forced to crouch their ATLAS 5s.
Eventually we had to stop when the way forward simply became too narrow.
TJ’s voice came over the comm. “The Observer Mind is less than five hundred meters ahead.”
“Five hundred meters and we can’t go any farther,” Facehopper said. “Bloody hell. Mauler, anything from your drone?”
“Nothing,” Mauler answered.
“Maybe we should turn back, try a different passageway?” Fret sent, echoing my own thoughts.
“Are you kidding?” Facehopper returned. “When we’re this close? TJ, launch your support drone.”
“Launching,” TJ answered.
His own drone emerged, weaving past the crouched mechs in front of it to vanish down the tunnel.
“Just lost contact, two hundred meters in,” TJ transmitted. “Too much interference.”
The squad waited, keeping their mechs bowed low.
I was a little glad I wasn’t in an ATLAS anymore—I could only imagine the muscle soreness that cramped posture inflicted on my brothers. Some of the mechs were visibly shaking as the external actuators mirrored the micromovements of their operators. Well, they were MOTHs, after all. They could take it.
After five minutes, TJ’s drone still hadn’t returned.
“All right, mates,” Facehopper said over the comm. “Before we do anything else, I want some theories on the drones. What the hell happened to them?”
“Probably got possessed,” I said. It was the obvious answer, at least to me, given that there were no EM emitters built into them.
“That, or destroyed,” TJ sent. “Either way, I’m guessing more than a few Phants are waiting for us up ahead.”
Facehopper remained silent for a moment. “It’s only five hundred meters. We can do this, mates. We can get this done. But . . . we’re going to have to do it without mechs.”
“I was afraid you’d say that,” Fret transmitted.
“That’s right, eject, you wankers! We’re going in via jumpsuits.” Facehopper’s mech crouched further and the cockpit opened up. He emerged in his jumpsuit. “We’ll come back and retrieve the ATLAS 5s after we’ve placed the warhead.”
“And what if we can’t?” Fret countered. “What if a cave-in blocks our way back? Or Phants possess the mechs after we leave? The emitters are in our jumpsuits, not the ATLAS 5s . . .”
“We’ll have to take the risk,” Facehopper said over the comm. “I’d set a guard, but I don’t want to split off anyone at this point. We have to stick together, now above all times. Because like you said, we might not be coming back this way.”
“But what are we supposed to do without mechs?” Fret sent.
“We’ve been in worse situations without ATLAS 5s,” Facehopper returned. “We’ll survive. Let’s get this done, mates.”
Cockpit hatches cracked open all along the single-file line, and my squad brothers climbed to the cave floor. I unbuckled myself from Antares’s passenger seat and swung down.
We retrieved rifles, grenades, and other armaments from the storage compartments in the back legs of the mechs. Spare ammo was passed around and I loaded up. Bomb, our breacher, gathered the few microexplosives we had.
We proceeded forward in our jumpsuits.
Ghost, Trace, Mauler, and I ported the nuclear payload. That’s right, it took all four of us. And to think, we’d actually thought the device felt heavy before.
At least I wasn’t the only one without a mech anymore. I was back in the game. Still, I felt extremely vulnerable without those ATLAS 5s around me. There was something to be said about being in the middle of a group of twelve-meter-tall mechs, each one capable of taking down a small army.
I wondered if I could persuade Ghost to give me an evolution in Antares when we returned this way.
Yeah, good luck with that. I’d have better luck convincing him of the existence of spirits.
We passed the two-hundred-meter mark, the last known position of TJ’s drone before it exceeded signal range.
The tunnel continued to tighten, so that eventually we had to crouch while wearing our jumpsuits, too.
“Getting a bit cramped,” Fret said.
The walls on either flank pressed in as well, forcing those of us who ported the payload to move ei
ther to the front or back of the device. Eventually that stopped working as the cave shrunk further—the nuclear payload was simply too wide for the tight confines.
“All right, this will have to do,” Facehopper said over the comm. “Let’s arm the payload, Bomb.”
Some of my brothers exchanged confused glances.
Facehopper noticed. “The signal source is less than a hundred meters away. The vaporization range of a nuke of this yield will cover that easily. Am I right, Cyclone?”
I nodded. “The Observer Mind will be incinerated. Even if our readings are off and the target lies beyond the vaporization limit, the blast wave will finish the job.”
Facehopper tipped his helmet to me in thanks. “There you go. Sure, maybe if we turn back and port the device down a different tunnel, we might be able to get a little closer. Then again, if we do that we might find ourselves even farther away, in an even worse jam. And who knows how many minutes or hours we’ll lose in the process? Right here, right now—this is probably the closest we’ll ever get with the payload. And I’m happy with that.”
Trace didn’t seem impressed. “How can we be sure the target is actually there if we don’t see it with our own eyes?”
“We’re a hundred meters away,” Facehopper replied. “The intermittent EM pings the Observer Mind sends out have to be fairly accurate at this range.”
“Unless those pings come from a decoy.”
“If they’ve set up a decoy, then we’re a thousand klicks off target anyway and the mission is a scrub.” Facehopper flashed a weary smile behind his faceplate. “I don’t think we’d be able to tell a decoy from the real thing anyway. One hundred meters, mates. I’d say we’ve successfully reached our objective. We don’t need to actually see the damn thing. This is it. We’re going to arm the payload and get the hell out. Now please, Bomb, with me.”
I was relieved to be placing the final warhead. Sure, while I was mildly curious about what the Observer Mind actually looked like, I didn’t care to meet whatever had taken out those drones. I wasn’t so eager to lose my life in these cramped tunnels.
The only worry I had was that the drones might have betrayed our positions. Launching them may not have been the wisest choice, but I could understand why Facehopper did it. He didn’t want us going into this tunnel blind.
Mauler and I had been porting the front end of the nuclear, and so we had to make room for Facehopper and Bomb; there was just enough space for the two of us to crawl over the device. We joined Ghost and Trace at the rear of the payload and then watched Facehopper work.
When the device was armed, Facehopper entered a three-hour countdown, which coincided, incidentally, with the detonation time of the first nuclear.
When it was done, Facehopper transmitted: “All right, let’s return to the ATLAS 5s, mates. I feel damn vulnerable like this.”
I concurred, as did the rest of the squad I’m sure. Too bad I’d have to revert to being a passenger again.
I turned around. Ghost and Trace stood in front of me, and they were still facing the warhead. The light from my headlamp glimmered off something past them, farther down the cramped tunnel.
I focused my headlamp on the spot, revealing a wall of some kind that completely sealed our retreat. In the light, the wall seemed to shift and shimmer hypnotically. When I zoomed in with my aReal, I realized it was composed of fist-sized insects—the very same ones that had enveloped the Queen.
I heard the things over my helmet speakers then. They produced a soft, sickening crinkle, like a thousand roaches scuttling over aluminum foil.
“Facehopper, we have a problem,” I said.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Rade
The three enemy mechs continued their relentless assault from the rooftop while I clung to the side of the building with my weapons hand. Their Gatling fire riddled the ballistic shield I carried in the other arm; in seconds those high-energy bullets would bore through the metal and into my mech. Unlike ATLAS 6s, the model 5s didn’t have ballistically enhanced hulls. The unshielded metal would allow the gunfire to tear right through the cockpit and into my jumpsuit. Some of the bullets would probably emerge from the rear of the mech, killing my two passengers.
As the gunfire continued unabated, I frantically wracked my brain, trying to find a way out.
But then the Gatling threads swung upward.
Hijak and Skullcracker were drawing the incoming fire away.
I exhaled in relief, watching as the ATLAS 5s of my two friends arced past, shields directed toward the Gatlings. They landed on the rooftop above me.
I was about to launch my jumpjets to join them when something struck the building above me. Shards of glass plunged onto my shield.
I peered past the rim: One of the enemy ATLAS mechs clung to the steel girder five meters up. Its Gatling was pointed right at me.
I ducked behind the shield as the enemy unleashed several threads of superheated bullets at close range. Blisters of metal erupted upon the underside. There were maybe two seconds before the shield failed.
I had to free my weapons arm.
I rammed the edge of my shield through the glass window of the floor above and wedged it in place as far as I could. The broad shield still protected my mech from the Gatling fire, but just barely. I released the girder with my weapons arm, hoping the shield would be able to hold up my three-tonne body.
It did.
I directed my Gatling past the edge of the shield and switched to the weapon’s POV. The enemy ATLAS 5 was in my crosshairs. It gripped the building just like me, with one hand wrapped around a support girder. But instead of a shield in its free hand, it wielded a Gatling—the source of those superheated bullets raining down on me.
The enemy mech was defenseless.
Before the ATLAS could spot my exposed barrel, I opened fire on its brain case.
The one hundred rounds per second from my Gatling tore through the unshielded metal hull and into the brain, destroying the AI so that the Phant inside had nothing to possess.
The incapacitated enemy ATLAS let go of the building and plunged toward me.
I crouched behind my shield.
The enemy mech impacted.
My shield, wedged within the building, immediately tilted downward. I felt it slipping beneath our combined weight, so I slammed my weapons hand into the space underneath it and grasped the steel girder.
The disabled ATLAS slid off the reinforced shield and plummeted toward the horde below. The metallic body landed on the black substance caking the lower half of the building and then bounced the rest of the way down, clearing a path through the waiting crabs.
I retracted the shield, knowing enemy snipers from the surrounding buildings probably had me in their sights.
I glanced upward, estimating the distance to the rooftop, and then I shoved off from the girder and activated my jumpjets.
“Giger, Tung, you guys all right?” I said in midjump, remembering the civilian passengers I carried.
Neither of them answered.
“Giger? Are—”
“Yes yes,” I heard Giger’s frightened voice over the passenger comm. “Can we land now?”
“Roger that.” I touched down on the rooftop.
Hijak and Skullcracker had taken care of the other two mechs and were just finishing up the remaining Centurions. Liquid Phants seeped out of brain cases all over the place.
“Took you long enough,” Hijak sent, glancing at me after taking out the final Centurion.
I approached the opposite side of the rooftop. Only one more jump to the destination.
I gazed up at the thirteen-story tower in front of me. Only one street and five stories separated us from the rooftop, but I couldn’t make out any of my squad brothers near the topmost edges even when I zoomed in. There weren’t any combat robots jetting up its sides t
o attack, which could mean the squad wasn’t there anymore. Though the more likely explanation was the havoc Hijak, Skullcracker, and I had just caused.
“Chief, we’re coming up,” I said over the squad-level comm. “Don’t fire. Do you copy, Chief?”
No answer.
Had they actually been forced to abandon the rooftop, or were they all dead instead?
No. They were simply out of comm range. That had to be it.
We vaulted toward the final rooftop. Even though it should have been obvious by then that we were the good guys to anyone observing from above, I repeated into the comm: “Don’t fire, over.”
The incoming missile alarm sounded. For a moment I thought the attack came from the rooftop, but I realized it was sourced from the streets below. I activated my Trench Coat, initiated evasive maneuvers, and continued upward as the rockets exploded behind me.
As I neared the top, Lui finally answered. “Don’t soil your cool vents on me, big fella. We see you.”
I was never so relieved to hear Lui’s voice.
We reached the rooftop to find the rest of the squad members exhausted and almost out of ammunition. Everywhere there were pools of glowing Phants, always keeping at least one meter away from the men and the nuclear payload. The liquid entities flowed from the paths of our newly arrived mechs. In their midst, I spotted several fallen enemy ATLAS 5s that had attained the rooftop. It must have been hell to take those out, though I suspected the mechs had come up one at time, in the order they reached the building. That was a tactical error—if the enemy had held them back and waited until it could send in four or five at once, my brothers would have been utterly overwhelmed. We got lucky. Then again, so far the enemy had acted in a fairly disorganized fashion. It seemed like they didn’t have any overall leadership, at least for now. Best to take advantage of that fact while we could.
“Welcome back,” Lui sent. “You missed quite the fight.”
“As did you,” I retorted. “Though I’m afraid we haven’t seen the end of it yet.”
Lui nodded grimly. “We haven’t.”
Everyone was on his feet, except for the Chief and Bender.
