by Justin Sloan
“You’re serious right now?” Scorpio asked, finally speaking up. “Your people took out a team of PD soldiers?”
“Didn’t hurt that there were only two of ‘em. Guess they didn’t think Swinger would be such a tough target.”
Scorpio nodded—he could buy that.
“And Intrepid?” Alice asked.
“Exactly the question you need to be asking,” the Heel replied, turning to go. “Like I said, Swinger’s safe, along with his companion for the evening. We hear there’s movement on the upper side, where your boy Intrepid has a room. We also hear it’s a team the size of which we aren’t getting involved with. Do yourself a favor and run, then pray to whatever alien gods you hope are out there… because he’s either far from his home, or he’s done for.”
They exited, a sneer from one of the thugs before the door closed behind them at the far end of the chamber.
“Dammit,” Scorpio said, kicking at the air.
“Dammit?” Alice shook her head. “Nah, this is good news.”
“You were here too, right? You heard what she said?”
“I heard her say Swinger was safe. That’s good enough news for me.”
“And Intrepid?”
“Is a big boy. He can handle himself until we get there.” She scrunched her nose in thought, weighing the options, and then made for the stairs on the far side that led to a small hatch through the roof. “But we don’t have time to dawdle.”
“There’s a whole team of them moving around up there!”
“If they can even find his room, sure.” She opened the hatch, already pushing through. All of the damn secrecy her team had, as necessary as it was, served as a stumbling block at the moment. She knew generally in what sections of the space station their rooms were, or at least where to find them when needed, but couldn’t be certain. With Intrepid, at least, the enemy intel they’d gathered seemed to confirm her own findings from before. “I’m not leaving anyone from my team behind, and we have to at least find out for ourselves. I wouldn’t trust the Heel if my life depended on it.”
“Which it very well might,” Scorpio reminded her, looking up at her. He glared, shook his head, and then chuckled. “For some reason, I can’t say no to you. Dammit, I can’t say no.”
“Then hurry your butt up here, as the only other option in my book is ‘yes.’”
He pocketed his baton and followed her up, mumbling to himself the whole time. That was fine. She’d take a disgruntled Scorpio any day of the week over no Scorpio. Considering what she was about to face? She could damn sure use the help.
5
Stealth: Upper Chambers - The West Wing
The west wing was called so because it was the housing section of Admiral Nor. She was top dog, and this section was off-limits to many on the space station. The name was some reference to an old film from the early days of movies—at least, that’s the rumor Stealth had heard. Such talk often went over his head, and the most he knew of movies was the training videos he’d been shown as part of PD’s new soldier program.
This area also happened to be where many of the special fight teams were located, namely the Taipans. Guards had scanning systems in place and were ready for him as he walked through the well lit and decorated hallways—metallic walls that, unlike most of the space station, were made to look like a getaway destination.
He supposed it was Admiral Nor’s idea. She couldn’t have people coming up here and feeling anything other than power and greatness. Once past the guards, the walls portrayed images of the legendary wonders of Earth. At one point he stopped and stared at the wall, the image with its three-dimensional effects making him almost able to believe he was looking down at the Sphinx and the pyramids of Egypt. At another he was walking along the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, waves of fog incoming—and he could almost feel the cold mist upon his face.
The images continued—the coliseum of Rome, the twin towers of New York, the great opera house in Sydney, and other wonders lost to history.
So much had been destroyed during the War of Gods, as it was called. No actual gods were involved, but it had been so disastrous that the name seemed to fit. Maybe War of the Devil would’ve been more appropriate, but Stealth wasn’t in charge of naming historical events.
All they had now were images such as these. Rich people were able to enter simulation chambers and feel like they were actually there, down to the smallest details, getting sand in their shoes and sunburns if they weren’t careful.
It wasn’t real, though, so Stealth had never understood why anyone would want to go to that expense. Now that he was here, able to get a glimpse of what it might be like, he was certainly tempted. At a minimum, he could understand the obsession.
Another guard stood ahead, watching him with a smile.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?” the guard said when Stealth was close enough to hear him. “Your new home.”
It hadn’t hit him that he would actually be living here now, instead of the barracks where they kept all the new additions to the PD forces. Most were new, actually, and now that he thought about it, he wasn’t entirely sure how long the program had been around. He knew that elite groups such as those that Nightshade ran stayed in elite quarters, but that didn’t necessarily mean they had been around longer.
“Name’s Jakob, but…” The guard leaned in as if sharing a secret, “call sign is Stormfighter.”
“Bullfrog is what we actually call him,” another voice said, and Stealth turned to see a man approaching in shorts and a Hawaiian shirt. Very out of place here, but a true sign of the elite. Hawaii had been made into one of the most exclusive living destinations in New America, where someone could only live if they’d bought their way in. Stealth had heard that to wear a Hawaiian shirt if you weren’t from Hawaii was like wearing a Lamborghini personal jet jacket without being the owner of a Lamborghini jet.
“They call me whatever they want, but I know my real call sign,” the guard said, ignoring the newcomer to ensure that was clear, then standing at attention and saluting. Now that he had a frown on his face, with his mouth drooping down and his large, pockmarked cheeks, he did bear a slight resemblance to a bullfrog. “Stormfighter reporting in, sir. We have a newb.”
The man chuckled as he saluted back, the act annoying Stealth. In the Marines, nobody would salute in such a lazy manner, without uniforms or covers… and indoors, no less.
“This isn’t a newb,” the man said, running a hand through thick, black hair. The act brought extra attention to how close his hairline was to his thick eyebrows, and how startlingly orange his skin was. Either he had just come from Hawaii, or was trying damn hard to pretend.
“Sir?” the guard asked, after a moment’s silence.
“They call me Tropical when they like me, Dickhead when they don’t.” Mr. Hawaii took Stealth’s hand and shook it fervently, then smiled at the guard. “You’re standing in the presence of a war hero, son. Back in the Marines, Stealth was in the Battle for Amadora. Lost, but hell, I heard the stories. Many lives were saved because of this man.”
For a moment, Stealth stared ahead, blankly. Had he done that?
Images flashed into his mind from long ago, repressed. They were murky, unclear, like a dream. Men and women in uniform, screaming as missiles shot over their heads and hit a line of mechs. Everyone wore advanced battle armor and helmets to match, not quite like what they wore here with Project Destiny, in the days before their exoskeletons.
He saw himself charging forward, unloading an advanced assault rifle into the enemy lines, the waves of drones, the fire and blood, the death.
Pulling bodies out of the fray, checking for life. Then a mech, almost down, its pilot throwing herself free.
Another mech was moving for the attacking line, and would squash them if Stealth didn’t act. He’d run to the nearly destroyed mech and leaped in. Taking advantage of the moment the other mech had its back to him, he opened up on it. His mech couldn’t move, but the
weapons worked.
A line of well-placed barrage missiles hit it. The enemy mech fell, was about to push itself back up, when the ground troops swarmed in, hitting it with all they had. Then one yelled, “BACK!” and something was flashing.
The enemy mech driver had hit self-destruct, and if they didn’t do something about it, at least half of the nearby ground forces would be dead. While Stealth’s mech couldn’t move, he realized there might be another option here. Turning on its thrusters, he aimed the mech, and then jumped.
The mech plowed through dirt and bodies like a bulldozer, then hit the enemy mech and knocked it back. By the time the explosion came, the mechs were clear of doing any harm to anyone other than themselves.
The woman mech pilot stood, turning to face him. Her face was a blur. A dark form appeared, moving like a mouth, and then…
“Stealth?” Tropical was there, snapping his fingers in front of Stealth’s face. “You back with me? Hello?”
It took a second for Stealth to reorient himself, but then he nodded and apologized. “Not the best of times, back then. Hero or no.”
“I’ll bet,” Tropical said with a hearty laugh. “Hey, take all the time you need, as long as it’s within the next twenty minutes. Then we roll out.”
“No time wasted, huh?” Stealth asked. “Good.”
“We have a mission, you have a trigger finger. Might as well make use of you.”
Tropical led him off.
“Thanks, Stormfighter,” Stealth said with a nod back to the guard, noting the way he stood taller at that. Nothing wrong with keeping those nearby happy.
The older man gave him a sideways glance, then led him up several steps and into a raised room. A door slid aside with a hiss and a warm burst of air flowed out. Nothing like the metallic cold of the space station, or the stale air of the down below.
“You’ll get used to it,” Tropical said.
“Won’t it make us… complacent?”
“Oh, you think this is for our comfort?” Tropical led him past tables and chairs, a few couches and walls lined with books. “It’s overflow heat, from the training room.”
Stealth frowned, confused, until Tropical moved his hand over the sensor at the far door. It slid open to reveal a glowing hallway, sounds of grunting within. A glance inside showed two women training, each with a pair of fighting sticks, working a pattern as sweat dripped to drench their tank tops and shorts.
A gulp, and Stealth turned away.
“Good attitude,” Tropical noted. “Honestly, some men stare, get lost in a sight like that. Glad to see you’ll fit in—each of us is a member of the team. No room for distractions.”
“It’s a test?”
“Hell no, we don’t do that here.” Tropical led him back to a series of doors on the other side of the room. “You’re part of the team already. That’s just two people training, and me observing your behavior. If it were a test though, you’d have passed.”
“Thanks?”
Tropical chuckled, then slid a hand across another sensor. He led him through a hallway to various open doors, each with humble rooms within. Beds, in some cases bookshelves, and a line of weapons.
“Our rooms?” Stealth asked. They weren’t anything fancy, but were far better than the barracks he had come from.
Tropical paused at one that was relatively empty, except for a suit of armor laid out on the bed and an exoskeleton, standing as if occupied, against the wall.
“This is yours,” Tropical said. “Get suited up.”
“For?”
“Time to test out the new gear, let your body get used to it.” Tropical pointed back over his shoulder to a door they hadn’t been through yet. “I want you moving in that thing as if you’d been training with us for years. You have substantially less time than that. Oh, and… you’ve had your meds?”
Stealth licked his lips. Meds—the term for the experiments conducted on them. Genetic engineering, some called it. He nodded, then confirmed by adding, “Yes. All of them.”
“You’ll get more, but only when we see where you need ‘em.” Tropical turned to head for the door he had pointed out. “I’ll be in there, waiting.”
More meds? A chill ran up Stealth’s spine and bile filled his mouth. Sure, he was faster and stronger now. No doubt about that. But there was something off about his mind, and it was worse every time he got more meds. Not just the lack of memory, either. It was bad enough that he wasn’t sure who he had been in the days on Earth, other than a Marine. Was there a family back there, waiting for him? Children, or even a little puppy, maybe? He had no idea.
It was possible too that his lost memory didn’t even have to do with the meds. He wasn’t sure, because he couldn’t remember a time before the meds. The meds left him feeling something else. A rage. A bloodlust. His mind would spin, his muscles expand to the point where he was sure they would explode, and then he would want nothing more than to cause havoc.
It felt so right, and yet so wrong. He knew it wasn’t him, that it was the genetic manipulation… that he was a different sort of person completely.
And now they were going to do even more of that to him.
Not that he could do anything about it, or even necessarily would if given the choice. He was, after all, a PD soldier. He had a duty, and if that duty meant becoming the equivalent of a demigod in terms of speed and strength, at the cost of his sanity, then he would damn well do it.
He swapped out his old body armor for the Taipan standard issue, then stepped into his new exoskeleton. He felt its connection points meld with the body armor, sensing as his supports strengthened and his balance became enhanced. When wearing this, he felt almost anything was possible.
Combine it with a stim shot—the drug they received when going on extra duties or needed that boost of energy—and he would likely believe he could go running outside and leap off into space. He’d have to ensure that never happened, of course. Maybe write a note in the inside of his helmet. “Whatever happens, don’t jump into space.” He chuckled at the thought, then put on said helmet and grabbed the rifle laid out for him, feeling its grip in his gloved hands.
Then he sat on the bed, staring at the inside of his helmet. He wasn’t one to linger on thoughts of fallen comrades, but he still remembered many of them from his time as a Marine. At the oddest moments he would get flashbacks of their smiles, brief memories of joking around with them in the barracks, sharing a flask, or even brief physical encounters—though he could never picture the face in these last memories. The body was always the same… but the face always a blur. Since the memory came with the rest, he assumed she too was a fallen comrade. Someone from his past who no longer mattered.
Red was different in that he wasn’t just a memory. He was a recent friend, as far as friends went up here.
He wasn’t about to let himself get dragged down by the negativity, though, so he stood up and made his way to the training room.
Tropical whistled from the other direction, waving him over. Not the room he’d seen the two ladies training in, but another one. He jogged over, anxious to see what he was getting into, and saw Tropical had put on his own armor and exoskeleton. When Tropical stood aside so he could see in, though, he took a step back.
Heights were never his strong suit. Shooting? Check. Hand-to-hand combat? Check. But whenever they had made him climb the ropes across the ponds or try rappelling down towers, he had frozen up. Passed, sure, but only by pure grit and determination, pushing himself through the terror.
Now he was looking out at a room that opened into the bowels of the space station. A ledge led to ropes that dangled or tied other ledges together, huge drop-offs, and pillars staggered throughout with nothing connecting them at all.
A step forward allowed him to see down, and the view took his breath away. Instead of the darkness and metal he had expected, he could see what appeared to be pure space. Stars… going on, forever. Something moved down there, in the darkness, blotting out the st
ars. A shape appeared.
Eyes—red. Staring, and then they were gone.
“Forget this,” Stealth said, stepping back.
He was met with resistance. Tropical’s hand pressed against his back, pushing him forward, over the ledge.
Screams tore from Stealth’s lungs as he plunged downward, hands reaching for the ropes he had seen, but finding none. He realized his life wasn’t flashing before his eyes, because, dammit, he couldn’t remember it. A blur, images moving and a distant laughter—but nothing more.
This was his end, and he didn’t even know what he had been through in life, what he had accomplished. Sure, he was some war hero. Sure, he had served as a member of Project Destiny here on Space Station Horus, but… what did it matter, truly? Without family, without anyone left behind to remember him, to carry on his name and bloodline, it all felt so purposeless.
He closed his eyes, the metallic pillars leaving him behind. Falling, falling, falling… he thought, until he realized he wasn’t moving at all. He felt air pushing against his armor, and when he opened his eyes again, he saw that he was suspended above a flickering floor, the images of stars and an eerie movement still there.
Or… not there at all.
“Not funny!” he shouted.
Laughter burst out from above, and then a click sounded. A split second later, the lights came on and the image disappeared to reveal a foggy glass floor. Just like the pyramids and other images he had seen on the simulation walls on his way in, this had been an illusion. It was a fair drop, to be sure, but the image was basically a projection system.
The stars and darkness of space, even the creature with the red eyes, or whatever he’d thought he had seen—all part of the illusion.
And then the air stopped, and he fell the last two feet. Arms thrust out and legs bent, he caught himself on all fours, exoskeleton giving him the support needed. A quick push and he was back on his feet, staring up at Tropical above.
