Drones

by Rob J. Hayes

  “What happened?” I ask Kendall. Milly is still shouting, filling the comms with her pleas.

  “Gaia’s green skin, would you shut up!” Kendall screams. Milly’s eyes dart sideways for a moment and then she shakes her head, sobbing loudly. At least she stops screaming. “He started shaking, violently. Eyes rolled back into his head. Then he started vomiting blood. Lots of it.”

  Kendall shakes her head.

  Milly is muttering something. I can’t quite hear what it is. She must see the same thing we do. There’s simply no way Simon is still alive, not with that much blood lost. Even if he was, vomiting blood is a sure indication that something is wrong inside of him and we still have hours trapped in the Darts, unable to help him. She doesn’t want to see it. She wants to believe, to hope that he might still be alive. That he’ll just wake up and be fine. She’s fooling herself. Simon is dead.

  I look to my left, towards the timer. We have less than one hour before we hit the Earth’s atmosphere. That’s when I start to feel the sadness. The grief. This was Simon’s crusade, more than anyone else’s. He got so close only to fall mere minutes before he got a chance to prove himself. To finish what he started. Simon would never see if we managed to succeed, and without him, I have my doubts.

  “Milly.” The woman doesn’t respond. She’s still crying. Her eyes are wet and red and she can’t even rub at them through the helmet. She draws in a ragged breath and lets it out as a sob. I’ve seen despair before, I’ve seen grief. Milly is deep into it. A powerlessness that paralyses, shuts down coherent thought. She’s on the edge and we need to pull her back from it. Without her, we can’t succeed. We don’t even have a reason to try.

  “Shame we can’t just slap her.”

  I choose not to point out that Kendall isn’t helping. I don’t really think she’s trying to. Perhaps she doesn’t realise that if Milly doesn’t snap out of it, we’ll all be arrested on top of the Me.com tower for nothing.

  “Milly!” I say again, more forcefully this time. “Think about the mission. Think about what Simon would want. I’m not asking you not to grieve. I’m asking you to honour his memory and his last wish.” I’m not sure how much of it is true. Probably some at least. I think at this point I’d tell the woman anything if it would get her mind back on track.

  Slowly, Milly looks up into the camera. The tears have left her eyes red and raw. Wet marks tracking down her cheeks. She gives a short nod and then looks away.

  “How long before the thrusters start slowing us down?” Kendall asks.

  Milly takes a few moments to respond. “Twenty-seven minutes.”

  Kendall pulls a face into the camera. “I’m gonna get another twenty minutes sleep then. Wake me up if anyone else dies.”

  Milly looks up at that, a hurt look on her face, but Kendall’s eyes are already closed.

  In the quiet I hear the beeping again. It’s faster now. Every second, and the red light isn’t blinking on and off anymore. It’s on. All the time.

  Stealth tech is military grade for a reason. It’s banned for all commercial uses. Its composition and creation is one of the UEA military’s closest kept secrets. If a Lunar or Martian based terrorist group ever got their hands on some, they could build missiles that were undetectable without either the exact transponder frequency, or by the good old fashioned way of looking with your eyes. How Simon got his hands on it I will never now he’s dead. I’m glad he did though. Without it, we’d likely be shot down long before we even reach Earth’s atmosphere.

  Another monitor flickers to life in front of me. It shows an image of Earth, our projected route. We’re on course. We should crash down right on top of the Me.com tower. I hope the Darts can survive it. I hope they can protect us. Crashing down on Lunar soil isn’t nearly so violent or dangerous. Earth has more atmosphere. More gravity. More armed response teams.

  Kendall still has her eyes closed. Her breathing looks regular. Deep. She looks peaceful. It’s almost a shame to wake her, but she’ll be angry if we don’t. Milly has stopped crying at least, but her eyes look sunken. There’s a deep sorrow on her face. Lines etched plainly where there weren’t any before. I can still see Simon as well. The camera in his pod is still active. His Dart is still falling with us. He is still dead, his helmet covered in drying blood. I wonder just what the relationship between the two was. They have a look about them, almost as though they’re related.

  “Kendall.”

  She opens her eyes slowly, blinking away the dazed look. Just in time to hear the thrusters fire. They’re loud in the pod. A dull roar fired in long bursts, slowing us, and shorter bursts, to correct the course.

  Kendall lets out a groan. “I can hear your thrusters over your comms, Robot.”

  “Deal with it. I can’t exactly move to mute my comms.”

  It’s a strange feeling, slowing down at that speed. Almost like the reverse of before. I feel my stomach rise. Taste bile in the back of my throat. I’m hard pressed to decide which sensation is more unpleasant.

  Another burst of thruster fire. I taste that bile in my throat again and grit my teeth against the urge to retch. Milly doesn’t do as well as Kendall or myself. I see her struggle in the feed and then she lurches forwards, vomit hitting the inside of her helmet. It’s selfish, but I’m glad I’m not in her suit. I’ve never been good with vomit, even when it was Summer’s.

  The display tells me we’re entering Earth’s atmosphere. The pod warms up quickly. Simon claimed the ceranium was an effective heat shield. Claimed it would keep us from boiling inside the pods. He never claimed it wouldn’t be uncomfortable though. I close my eyes and try not to imagine my death. Try not to imagine the Dart breaking apart in the intense heat of re-entry into the Earth’s atmosphere. Try not to imagine the thrusters failing and the velocity dashing both the Dart and myself on the streets of New York.

  I hear the thrusters fire again and hear Milly retching over the comms. It’s a rough ride. The pod is shaking all around me and I’m shaking with it. Rattling to my very bones. I open my eyes again to see Kendall beaming a grim smile into the camera. I don’t know if she’s really enjoying the experience, or just determined to look like she is.

  More thruster fire. Short bursts, correcting course. The display in front of me shows our altitude at eighty-five kilometres and dropping far more quickly than seems survivable. I glance at Milly. She doesn’t look worried, but then she barely looks conscious. Some people don’t handle the turbulence so well.

  At fifteen thousand feet the first set of parachutes open and the pod lurches again. I hear Kendall curse and see tears on Milly’s face. The monitor in front of me flashes and an error message comes up. Something about the landing parachutes. My heart hammers. Fear pulses through me.

  “I’ve got a problem.” Both Kendall and Milly look up at the sound of panic in my voice.

  “What?” Milly asks.

  The first set of parachutes detach. They weren’t intended to slow the Darts down for landing, only to reduce our speed. The monitor shows a representation of the Darts approaching the Earth. At ten thousand feet the second set of parachutes deploy for the other pods. But not for mine. The error message flashes up again.

  “Robot?” Panic in Kendall’s voice as well.

  “Oh shit. Shit. Shit.” Milly’s eyes dart around frantically.

  I can see my altitude dropping on the monitor, can see my Dart pulling away from the others. Falling fast. Too fast.

  Panic. Powerlessness. Fear. I can’t even move. I’m trapped inside the metal coffin, falling to my death. I let out a growl that’s all frustration. I’ve always hated heights.

  “… manual release,” I hear Milly’s voice over the pounding in my ears and the growl in my throat. “Garrick, press the manual release button!”

  She’s right. There is a small button on the monitor in front of me that reads manual release. I struggle to lift my hand from my side, pulling it with all my strength. It scrapes against the atmo-suit. Slowly. So s
lowly. I drag my hand around my body and against my gut and up towards the monitor. My altitude reads five thousand feet and dropping.

  I wriggle. Struggle. Pulling my hand up inch by inch and then it pops free up by my chest and I mash my finger against the button.

  There’s a loud pop above me and the pod gives a sharp lurch. My head bashes against my helmet hard and I see bright white spots.

  “Robot, you OK?”

  I shake my head and hear a groan. It sounds close. Like it’s my own. I close my eyes for a moment, and start to drift off.

  “Garrick!” Milly’s voice, far away. I drag my eyes open and the white spots fade. “Garrick, you’re still travelling too fast.”

  “What?” I look down at the monitor again, dragging my hand away from the screen. My altitude isn’t dropping as quickly as before, but it’s still falling and falling fast. I’m still pulling away from the other Darts.

  All I can do is watch it count down. Three thousand five hundred feet. Three thousand feet. Two thousand five hundred. The world goes black.

  Chapter 29

  Happiness: Warming. Calming. Uplifting. One of the best sellers. A repeat seller too. Those who buy happiness almost always come back for more. It’s easy to cultivate too. Amazing what makes people happy.

  Muffled voices. Frantic. Shouting. Still muffled. Darkness. Pain. That’s how I know I’m not dead. There’s pain. I’m pretty sure death should be painless. Pretty sure it should be nothing. One moment you’re slap bang in the middle of life with all its messy connections and bright lights and feelings. Then next, you’re nothing. It all just stops.

  I hear banging. It sounds close. Too close. Painfully close. Sounds like it’s coming from within my own head. That, at least, would explain the pain. I try to move. To roll over. Away from the noise and the pain. I can’t. I’m stuck. Held tight. Maybe this is the Hell those religious people talk of. Trapped in darkness. Unable to move. In constant pain. Maybe not. I’ve never believed in their fiction. Never believed in God or Heaven. No sense starting to believe in Hell now.

  Something wet drips down onto my cheek and rolls slowly down to the corner of my mouth. It tastes metallic. Reminds me of a time long ago. I cut my finger on a cheese knife. I wasn’t paying enough attention. Too busy watching Summer dance along to some silly song that was playing on TV. I was making her a sandwich. The knife was sharper than I’d have thought. Sliced the flesh of my index finger. I remember blood on the chopping board. Cursing and hearing Summer gasp. I remember her saying she would tell mummy. Stuck my finger in my mouth and sucked at the blood. It tasted metallic.

  The banging sounds closer somehow. I hear the voices again. I know them. There’s a groaning noise as well. It’s not human. It sounds like the groan of metal bending and not wanting to. The voices are closer now. Women’s voices. Familiar somehow. I can make out the odd word.

  “… dead.”

  “… have … check … without…”

  I realise why it’s so dark. My eyes are closed. My eyelids are heavy. The very idea of prising them open seems like more effort than it’s worth. Still, I’ve always liked challenges. I used to play with jigsaw puzzles, the more pieces the happier I would be. The challenge used to thrill me.

  I drag my eyes open. There’s isn’t much to see. A soft blue light. A cracked monitor showing an error message. I can’t read it. My mind refuses to make sense of the blurred words.

  I try to move again, but I can’t. I’m stuck fast. Stuck in a coffin. A metal pod. Shooting to Earth. One of the parachutes wouldn’t open. I had to release it manually, but it was too late to slow me down. Crashed down much faster than I should have.

  “Hello?” I say. I attempt to shout it, but all I manage is a croak. My voice sounds thick to my ears. Slow.

  There’s a pause from the voices close by.

  “Did… that…”

  “Hello?” I say again. More loudly this time. More clearly. My mind is working again. Slowly. Like a computer booting up systems one at a time. Memories come trickling back. I realise how thirsty I am. How much I need to pee. I taste blood again and feel something wet and thick tracing its way down my forehead, dripping from my eyebrow onto my cheek. A head wound. Those are never good.

  “Robot?” The shouted voice is muffled behind the metal walls of the dart. It takes me a moment to recognise it as belonging to Kendall. “Get this thing open!”

  “Stand back.” That voice sounds like Milly. “No. To the side. Away from the door. James? Can you hear me?”

  I nod.

  “James?”

  “Yes.” Everything is fuzzy. I feel slow. It’s fading though. I’m coming round. Just wish I could move. I feel like I’ve been cramped up tight forever in this coffin.

  “You’re going to see a flash. The emergency door release is… explosive.”

  “Is that safe?” Kendall’s voice again. It sounds further away and full of worry. I don’t hear Milly reply.

  “Three. Two. One.”

  There’s a bright flash in front of me and the door rushes away, detached from the rest of the pod. It crashes into a wall about ten feet away with a solid thunk, and then another as it drops to the floor. The new light makes me squint. It’s dim, but bright enough for someone who has been in the dark for… I struggle for a moment, trying to remember how long the trip to Earth took. A day! Nearly a full twenty-four-hours trapped in the darkness of the dart. Travelling through the void of space.

  I push myself forwards and take a lurching step out of the dart. My right foot hits carpeted floor, strewn with debris. Glass, rubble, plastic. I lift my left leg and my right collapses, taking me with it. Kendall is there before I hit the floor. She grabs hold of me and takes my weight as I struggle to get my feet beneath me again.

  I’ve never noticed how much taller than Kendall I am. She seems quite short now as she supports my weight. She looks dusty. Her dark hair almost grey. Her darker skin smudged with grime.

  “You’re heavy, Robot.” I don’t need to see her face to know Kendall is gritting her teeth.

  I get my feet beneath me and take the weight from her shoulders. My knees give a little wobble, but hold. We’re in an office area of a building. I see carpeted floors, one half of a great wooden desk, cracked in two. The other half looks like it may have fallen down the hole in the floor. A light misty rain patters in from a hole in the roof. It’s dark above, night time. I catch a glimpse of the moon through the hole, a brightly lit crescent far above. Light bulbs flicker from the ceiling. Some are still intact, others have half detached. The place looks like a bomb hit it. A sentiment that isn’t far from the truth.

  “You’re lucky,” Milly says as she pulls my helmet off. The fresher air hits me like a wave and it’s followed quickly by nausea.

  I realise I’m still wearing my atmo-suit and start to pull bits off. Trying desperately to free myself. Seems important all of a sudden.

  “I don’t feel lucky.” I dump my atmo-suit on the floor and give my limbs a good stretch. Roll my head from side to side.

  The look on Milly’s face is lined with sadness. “Simon’s parachutes didn’t open either. His Dart crashed through the roof of the building.” She points to the hole in the floor with half a desk nearby. “Three floors down he came to a stop. I think crashing through the wreckage he left slowed you down a bit.”

  “Are you with us, Robot?” Kendall steps in front of me and holds up her hand.

  “Three fingers.”

  Kendall shares a look with Milly. “Close enough, I guess.” She shoves something into my hand. A pistol. Custom made, I can tell just by looking at it. “Try not to shoot me in the back.”

  “What?” My head is still fuzzy, but the mission comes back to me. The servers should be ten floors down. I hear a faint alarm somewhere in the distance.

  “By now the building will be in the middle of evacuation. Civilians should be gone, but we have security on their way up. Won’t be long before a real armed response shows up.”
Kendall grins. “Then things will get fun.”

  “There’s also that.” Milly points down the hole in the floor and I edge closer, peering down. I see fire. Orange flames licking at a wall. Trails of black smoke rising up. I can smell it too, now I think to take a sniff.

  “Yeah,” Kendall holds out a gun to Milly, but she just stares at it with wide eyes and shakes her head. “We don’t have much time and we’re wasting it standing around here.” She steps close to Milly and tucks the pistol into her trousers. “Nine floors down, right?”

  Milly nods. She’s holding her hands up, as though just touching the pistol might be hazardous to her health. “Judging by the public documents, that’s where the server room should be. From there I should be able to break into…”

  “Wonderful. On me, Robot.” Kendall stalks away. Her feet moving quickly and silently on the carpet. She looks like a feral cat on the prowl, following the signs that point towards the stairwell. I follow along behind her, not nearly as quietly. I’m still fighting the fuzzy edge to my vision. My head feels like a church bell at midday.

  “Are the security cameras still online?” I ask as I creep after Kendall.

  “Yes.” Milly sounds nervous. No doubt she thought Simon would be leading the assault. We all thought that. Plans change in an instant. I hear her tap on her PD. “I’m in their feed now. They’re shorting out on the top three floors because of the damage to the infrastructure, but they’re working fine on once we get past the crash.”

  “Can you shut them down?”

  “No. Not from here. I’d have to be linked in directly. From the server room. That’s the key. From there I can control the whole building. I can control the whole network.”

  “Could you just… bring it down? The whole network, I mean?”

  I hear her make a non-committal noise from behind. “Maybe. Probably. Not for long though. They’ll have off-site backups. I’m gonna have to keep them out of the system remotely while we send out the message just to make sure it doesn’t get cut off.”