by James Walker
There was only one other rookie in his entire unit, a fellow augment named Alpha. Alpha was even more of an oddity than he was. Although she had graduated from SAL at roughly the same time as Omega, he had never seen her during his entire tenure in the program. Apparently she had gone through some kind of experimental alternate training.
Aside from being the only rookies on the team, Omega and Alpha had one other thing in common: both of them had been assigned to experimental exosuit models fresh off the factory floor. These peculiarities made them outcasts among their teammates, who regarded their special assignments and bleeding edge equipment as evidence of special treatment. For his part, Omega never responded to his teammates' provocations. His only interest was the mission.
He opened his eyes in response to a trill from his exosuit's console. As his eyes came open, the first thing he saw was the artificial patchwork illumination of the instrument panels filling the dim cockpit. Then a sea of stars appeared before him, bordered by the metallic frame of the carrier's open bay doors. With the squadron suspended upside-down in low orbit over Chalice, the moon's ocher horizon hung at the top of his display.
A portrait flashed in the corner of the viewscreen, displaying a young communications officer with wavy chestnut hair and wide green eyes. The caption identified her as Ensign Sierra Ferrari of the Hydra, now flagship of the reclamation fleet since every senior vessel had been destroyed. Ferrari's eyes were wet with terror and her voice was tinged with fear, but she seemed to be keeping herself under control.
“Message from Captain Wyburn to Meteor Squadron,” she announced. “Let the air burn. Repeat, let the air burn.”
That was the code to commence their mission. The square-jawed face of Commander Gamma, the squadron leader, appeared next to Ferrari. “Message acknowledged, Hydra,” he said. “We're ready to launch.”
The portraits winked out and the squadron initiated launch procedures. Omega released his grip on his controls just long enough to squeeze the wrist of his flight suit, injecting him with the linkage fluid that would enhance his aggression, reflexes, and resistance to g forces. Although his mind still felt strangely serene, a burning readiness to kill began to bubble just beneath the calm surface.
One by one, the fighters of Meteor Squadron dropped out of the carrier and activated their thrusters, assuming escort formation around a fleet of dropships making its way to the surface. First went Gamma and Epsilon, their angular Arrow-3s spewing superheated propellant like great wings of fire. Alpha went next, the organic curves of her Blossom looking like a cybernetic flower. Then came Omega's turn to launch. His Arrow-4 Tsubasa, as a variable geometry model, was the only exosuit in his squadron with a dedicated fighter mode.
Meteor Squadron was composed of a single missile boat and four exosuits, all piloted by augments, plus an additional twenty Slayer class fighter drones. The Slayers were basically cannon fodder—although relatively cheap to produce and more effective than most normal pilots, their capabilities paled in comparison to augments. The right kind of human mind enhanced with drugs, nanomachines, and a little genetic tampering remained the ultimate killing machine, even after centuries of refined battle algorithms.
Meteor Squadron and their transport wards were approaching the upper reaches of Chalice's atmosphere when something flashed on Omega's sensor readout. His computer identified the signature as a Titan class defense satellite. An instant later, a flurry of additional signals appeared from the opposite direction: a volley of missiles launched from the moon's surface.
“We've got incoming,” Gamma announced. “Zeta, you take care of those missiles. The rest of you, assume delta formation and follow me. We'll splash that satellite before it can so much as sneeze at our dropships.”
Omega took his place in the formation and followed his teammates as they changed course to intercept the defense satellite. Their converging trajectories brought them within each other's ranges just as they crossed the threshold where the darkness of space began to give way to the colors of Chalice's atmosphere. Several particle beams lanced through Meteor Squadron's formation, destroying one of the Slayers, then Omega's readout exploded with more signals than the sensors could track, all originating from the satellite.
“What is that?” Alpha exclaimed, her voice tinged with alarm. “My sensors can't get a read on them.”
“Looks like a shitload of micro-drones,” Gamma replied. “That satellite ain't carrying a standard loadout. Stay on your toes, people.”
Meteor Squadron unleashed a flurry of missiles at the oncoming drones, destroying several of them in a dazzling display of distant fireworks. But the enemies' numbers were too great, and they continued their inexorable approach, penetrating the squadron's barrage of close-range defensive fire and falling upon them in a frenzied swarm. As they came within visual range, Omega could see that the drones were little more than metal spheres with small airfoils and maneuvering thrusters attached. The first wave exploded in an all-encompassing curtain of fire, taking several of the Slayers with them.
“Shit,” Gamma exclaimed. “It's a suicide attack!”
Although the squadron's furious sprays of defensive fire brought many of the suicide drones down, it was not enough. Several more Slayers fell to the onslaught, then an agonized scream from Gamma was abruptly cut off as his exosuit disintegrated into melted debris. No sooner had the wreckage of his suit dropped out of view than another group swarmed over Epsilon, vaporizing his craft as well.
In response, the bud-like shoulder extensions on Alpha's exosuit unfurled and ejected a dozen small wedges. The wedges swarmed over the remaining suicide drones from all directions, firing glowing beams. Unable to cope with attacks from all sides, the drones were quickly overwhelmed and destroyed. The wedges returned to the Blossom and flew back into its shoulder pods.
It actually works, Omega thought.
The DOTS—Detachable Operation Terminating System, a flock of remote-controlled mobile cannons for engaging multiple enemies or overwhelming elusive opponents. Although their functionality could be automated with a swarm A.I., their attack patterns were relatively limited when used in such a manner. The addition of a guiding human intelligence made them far deadlier. Since guiding so many mobile cannons simultaneously with manual controls would have been impossible, they were controlled mentally, with a partial dive system designed to read the operator's thoughts. Even then, the experimental system was notoriously difficult to use, so Alpha's uniquely high compatibility with the DOTS had gotten her assigned to the Blossom.
Omega's eyes flicked back to the sensor readout. Zeta's missile boat had its hands full intercepting the rockets being launched from the surface. Just then, several trills signaled another wave of enemy fighters coming from the defense satellite. The sensors identified the incoming enemies as repurposed P.S.A. high altitude interceptors. Omega had to afford some grudging respect to the rebels. They had cobbled together a formidable defense from a combination of makeshift suicide drones and stolen Union weaponry.
With Gamma and Epsilon down, it was Omega's duty to assume command of the squadron. “Good work, Alpha,” he said. “Now let's finish off this damn satellite so we can get back to the transports and support Zeta.”
He flew into the middle of the enemy swarm, downing the drone in the center with a shot from his particle cannon and breaking their formation. Two of the drones banked sharply and got on his six, firing their rotary cannons while attempting to acquire a missile lock. Omega evaded the double flurry with a barrel roll and a sharp bank, then executed a midair transformation. His airfoils unlocked from their fixed positions and unfurled into angelic wings while his thrusters separated into legs and his nose swung down to form a torso, revealing his exosuit's humanoid form. He fired all of his thrusters in full reverse, flinging his suit behind his pursuers with such crushing g forces that he nearly tore off his restraints.
Still conscious due to his enhanced circulatory system and the linkage fluid coursing through his ve
ins, Omega raised his head to see his two foes banking in opposite directions in an attempt to break him off their six. With no time to properly aim, he fired wildly at the right drone with his rotary guns and a rapid burst from his particle rifle. The flurry overwhelmed his target's evasive options and shot it out of the sky.
While Omega disrupted the enemy formation, Alpha's DOTs launched and fell upon them in a fury, firing from all directions and lighting up the thickening sky with a web of azure beams. Unable to cope with the omnidirectional assault, the remaining drones fell in rapid succession until only one remained.
The final drone flew straight at Alpha and unleashed a missile. She used one DOT that she had kept in reserve to shoot the missile down, then dropped below the oncoming fighter and lashed out with one arm. The nearly invisible microfilaments on her arm tore off the fighter's nose as it blazed right over her head, its debris tumbling through the clouds below.
Alpha's DOTs returned to their master and flew back inside their shoulder sheaths. Omega rejoined her and their two exosuits hovered over the clouds, surrounded by the twisting smoke trails of the downed enemy squadron.
Alpha's helmeted visage appeared on Omega's viewscreen. “You should be more careful, Lieutenant,” she said. “Maneuvers like that will tear your suit to pieces, not to mention your body.”
“Not much choice but to get a little extreme when we're outnumbered four to one,” Omega replied. “Now let's—”
He was interrupted by another trill from his sensors, announcing the destruction of Zeta's missile boat. He glanced down and saw the missile boat's fiery debris spiraling earthward, leaving the dropships exposed to further anti-air bombardments.
“Lieutenant,” Alpha exclaimed, “the transports—”
“I know,” he said. He conjured a holographic keyboard and input a rapid series of commands to the remaining Slayers. “I'll send the Slayers to cover for them while I finish off the satellite. Deploy your DOTS to cover me.”
As the Slayers dove to renew their escort formation around the dropships, Omega stowed his particle rifle and grabbed the weapon slung over his shoulder, a cannon with a barrel almost as long as his suit was tall. Aside from his Tsubasa's variable geometry capability, this was the experimental suit's other major innovation: the annihilation cannon. It loaded antimatter canisters which were detonated upon firing, compressing the resultant energy into a tight beam with the destructive power of a tactical nuke, but tightly focused and without any radiation fallout. It was the ultimate bunker buster and could even pose a threat to capital ships, but it could only carry up to three rounds per sortie, and the ammunition was incredibly expensive to manufacture. This would mark the first time it had ever been used in live combat.
As Omega zoomed in and took aim at the distant satellite, a flurry of azure beams arced around his position, then several plumes of smoke exploded from the side of the satellite and blazed toward him and Alpha. Unflinching, he remained hovering in place so as not to spoil his aim while Alpha deployed her DOTs and directed them to swarm over the oncoming missiles. A single missile made it through the fusillade and arced toward Omega's suit, only to be shot down by one of Alpha's hull-mounted particle cannons.
“Antimatter cartridge primed,” Omega reported. “Eliminating the target.”
With a dreadful roar, a white-hot beam erupted from the annihilation cannon and lanced into the defense satellite. There was a moment of stillness, then tongues of fire seeped their way through the seams in the satellite's hull. The satellite folded and crumpled at unnatural angles, then there was a blinding flash as an enormous sphere of destructive energy erupted from the point of impact, reducing the satellite and its crew to subatomic dust.
A strange feeling grew within Omega's gut. Unbidden and unwanted, an insane urge to laugh swelled inside him until he could no longer suppress it. First it escaped as a muffled giggle, then it erupted into gales of laughter—yet it was not laughter born of mirth or satisfaction, but a strained cry almost indistinguishable from violent weeping.
Alpha's face reappeared in Omega's viewscreen, her eyes wide and fearful. “L—Lieutenant?”
At once, the crazy urge to laugh vanished, and Omega composed himself instantly. “The satellite has been destroyed,” he reported, his voice back to its restrained monotone. “Let's rejoin the transports and finish our escort mission.”
Omega let his exosuit drop through the air for a few hundred meters before activating the jets and chasing after the dropships, with Alpha trailing some distance behind. They passed through a thin layer of high-altitude clouds, then a much thicker layer nearer the surface, emerging into a dim world of drizzling rain and distant lightning flashes. Omega's sensor readout crackled with static courtesy of the silence particles that interfered with all forms of electromagnetic transmission on Chalice.
Omega activated his suit's image enhancement, and the fractal contours of a coastal region appeared in his viewscreen. They were passing over a small town connected by a bridge to an island that housed what looked like a prison complex. One of the dropships veered off to land near the town while the rest scattered, heading for various objectives scattered across the region. The Slayers likewise dispersed to continue escorting the dropships to their landing zones.
“Looks like the transports made it to the surface with no losses,” Omega said.
“But we can't say the same for Meteor Squadron,” Alpha replied. “We lost Commander Gamma... Epsilon... Zeta...”
“We always expected heavy casualties on this operation,” Omega said. “Frankly, I think this is a surprisingly favorable outcome.”
Alpha paused. “That's cold.”
“You'd better get used to being cold yourself, if you don't want to join them.” Omega brought his suit to a stationary hover and watched the dropship set down just outside the town, deploying a company of marines and battle drones. “Let's get down there and provide some support for the grunts. If we can take that prison, we might be able to free some Union loyalists and anti-Concord resistance fighters.”
As he brought his exosuit low for ground support, Omega mentally reviewed the results of the operation so far. Although the task of fully securing Chalice would no doubt entail a long and grueling campaign, Spacy's victory was already assured now that they were in control of the moon's orbit. Yet Omega felt no sense of accomplishment, only growing certainty in a thought that had sprung in his mind the first time he laid eyes on Chalice's dusty glow:
This moon would be his grave.
Third Escalation
but I can't see
Another rumble shook the prison compound, causing a trickle of dust to fall from the ceiling into Janice's hair and eyes. As she coughed and rubbed the dust out of her eyes, her fellow prisoners furrowed their brows in concentration.
“Hey,” she coughed, “what do you think that rumbling is?”
“It's too many to be a coincidence,” came the deep voice of Tinubu from the next cell. “Something big is happening outside.”
“Is it construction?” Janice asked.
“I don't think so,” Vic replied. “It's hard to tell since it's so muffled, but it sounds to me like a battle.”
“It's too far away to be an assault on the prison, though,” Cena said. “They must be fighting in the town.”
“Who's fighting?” Janice demanded. “Friends of yours?”
“Don't know,” Cena replied. “It's possible.”
Janice felt a flicker of hope. “If you've got friends coming to rescue you, do you think they might take me out of here too?”
Cena favored Janice with a half smile. “Of course, Blondie. We won't leave you high and dry.”
A clang echoed down the hallway, followed by the approach of heavy footsteps. Janice and the others turned to watch the approach of three guards carrying rifles, escorting a single prisoner with hands and feet bound by heavy manacles. The prisoner had a dominating presence, standing considerably taller than either of his escorts, and even
his loose-fitting prison jumpsuit could not entirely conceal a mighty physique. His coarsely tanned, square-jawed countenance was incongruously topped by a shock of feathery white hair. But his most striking feature was the cybernetic lens in place of his left eye. As he approached, he cast a jeering grin at Janice and the others.
The guards stopped in front of the cells. The one in front unlocked the cell doors and gestured with his rifle for the occupants to come out.
“All right, get out here,” he ordered. “One at a time.”
“What's going on?” Janice asked.
“Transfer,” the guard replied. “Don't make me ask again.”
Janice left the cell first, remaining docile as one guard clamped heavy manacles around her wrists and ankles while the other two guards kept the prisoners covered with their rifles. Cena came next, then Vic and Tinubu, and all were manacled in turn.
“Now move.” The nearest guard pressed the muzzle of his rifle into Janice's back.
The guards escorted Janice and the other prisoners up to ground level and to a courtyard on the north side of the compound. A drizzling rain greeted Janice as soon as she stepped outside, courtesy of a carpet of ominous storm clouds cloaking the world in oppressive darkness. Now that she was outside, she could more clearly make out the distant rumbles as explosions. She glanced to her left and saw that the lift bridge had been raised. Beyond the bridge, flashes and tracer rounds lit the black silhouette of the town.
One of the guards gave Janice a shove that sent her stumbling. “Keep moving.”
At the edge of the courtyard, a transport helicopter sat idling on a landing pad. The guards pushed their escorts in the direction of the chopper.
“That's your ride. Move it.”
As she staggered toward the chopper, Janice cast one more glance over her shoulder in the direction of the battle. Just as her last hope of rescue began to crumble, she saw a burning light ignite on the far side of the bridge. The light grew brighter and brighter until the roar of an engine filled her ears and something crashed to the ground a few dozen meters away.
