REV: REV Warriors Book 1

by T. R. Harris

“Movie stars don’t die these days, Jog. They live on in digital. You should know that.”

  “I do and I don’t care. She’s still hot!”

  “And just think, they can make her do anything they want.”

  “Dammit, Gunny, now you have me thinking of things other than the mission….”

  His voice trailed off as the first of the pre-drugs was administered.

  “He’s gone,” said Manny Hernandez. “He should have some nice dreams thanks to you, Zac.”

  “In a few minutes the thrill of killing aliens will replace any wet dreams he has about a long-dead movie star.”

  Hernandez laughed. “Damn straight. We sure are a strange bunch, aren’t we, Gunny?”

  “No argument there. Drop in forty-five. Good luck Captain Keller.”

  “Same to you,” said the Marine officer. “Stay in touch.”

  “Yes sir.”

  The first part of the operation went off like clockwork. Jog landed fifty meters from the long, narrow crack in the black surface of the shield volcano and immediately jumped into the abyss, landing sixty feet down on the worn floor of the lava tube.

  The Qwin had brought up another twenty troops from the main cluster. Jog’s descent in a solitary pod had tipped off the aliens that this was a REV landing, so the Qwin near the entrance didn’t put up much of a fight. They retreated into the dark, basalt-lined tunnel, trying to get a jump ahead of the speeding REV. Half of them survived to meet up with the first fortified line of defense.

  The aliens had pulled down the sides of the tunnel on the left and right and were hiding behind piles of fallen obsidian rock. Zac watched the four cameras on Jog’s battle collar and saw his protégé execute a neat maneuver that impressed even him. Danny literally ran up one side of the lava tube, blasted the aliens on the right, and then performed a somersault and landed behind the Qwin on the left. None of the aliens at this location survived to tell the tale of the deadly acrobatic move.

  That still left over three hundred Qwin still in the tunnel. They ran to a fork in the lava tube and separated. In most circumstances this wouldn’t have been a problem. In a city or a building complex, the road grid could be tracked and the supporting Marines sent to intercept. The REV wasn’t expected to do all the work, just most of it. But in a complex of underground tunnels, each tube was often a separate channel unto itself and may never meet up with the main tube again.

  Jog paused, his supercharged brain scanning the fleeing aliens, before deciding that the group to the left was the larger. He sprinted after them.

  Zac hurriedly pulled up the scans of this new section of lava tube. All he had were satellite soundings, so the details weren’t well-defined. The tube was narrower here, which was fine for the REV, but it would limit the access for the recovery team and the trailing Marines.

  Capt. Keller and Col. Owens—the same officer duo who supported Zac on his last Run—were struggling to keep up. The second group of Qwin who had separated from the main force was back and harassing the Marines on their right flank. The Humans had to duck for cover every few feet and return fire.

  A squad of Marines moved past the others and took up a more permanent position within the main tube, providing cover for the rest of the force. Keller ordered his men forward, and once in the clear, they raced in Jog’s direction ahead of the main Marine contingent. It was nearing the ten minute mark and they were thirty seconds behind their REV.

  Zac studied a screen as flashes from Jog’s pulse rifle lit up the dimly lit tunnel. Alien bodies were everywhere; Jog was in the zone and nearing the end of his Run.

  Just then, Zac noticed something strange about the Qwin’s return fire. It wasn’t aimed at Jog. It took him a moment to realize the truth. They were shooting at the ceiling of the tube, directly above Jog.

  Zac brought his microphone close to his mouth and began to chant softly: “Roof, roof, roof…”

  The transducer wires leading into Jog’s head would relay the soft, constant message into the REV’s brain. It would register within the deep, subliminal recesses of his mind, giving the juiced up warrior a suggestion, a hint, something to consider.

  After a few seconds Zac noticed the angle of Jog’s camera shift upwards. He directed his fire at the top of a narrow part of the tunnel, above where most of the Qwin were hiding. Black rock began to rain down on the aliens, even as Zac could see the same shower of stone falling from the ceiling from Jog’s point of view. It was a race to see who could bring down the ceiling first.

  Jog lost.

  Since there was no such thing as retreat for a REV, Danny was still in the chamber when the roof fell in over him. He was knocked to the floor and buried by a huge pile of black volcanic rock. For a normal Human, this would have been fatal. But not for a REV. Jog, pressed, twisted and screamed, using his incredible strength, toughness of his NT-4-enchanced skin and remaining battle armor to lift the boulders from his body. They tumbled to the side as Jog struggled to get to his feet.

  He came out of the pile with his weapon firing, cutting down a line of aliens who had begun to close in on the pile of rock.

  Zac checked Keller’s position. He was almost to the small lava chamber with his recovery team. Two squads of Marines were only steps behind.

  Ten minutes, fourteen seconds into the Run. A look at Jog’s vitals showed that he was nearing Twilight time. The battle computer would make the final call.

  “Dammit!” Zac heard Keller yell out over a rumbling through the speakers.

  “Captain?”

  “The tunnel just gave way in front of us! We’re cut off from Gains.”

  Zac checked his screen. Jog was still firing, but he wasn’t advancing. Detectors on his battle armor reported a crushed right leg and a foot lodged within the boulders. Jog was trapped and his support cut off.

  It was eleven minutes into the Run and the young REV would be Twilighted any second. With no backup, he would be ripped to shreds by the aliens.

  Zac keyed in the destruct code. Techs to either side of him saw his hand move on console and knew what he was doing. No one in the room protested. They were just glad it wasn’t any of them making the call.

  With only the slightest hesitation, Zac pressed the execute button.

  The scene in the lava chamber flared only briefly before the screen went black.

  Zac leaned back in the chair and sighed. He felt a moment of loss and sadness, not from what he’d done, but for the loss of a friend and colleague. Although Jog didn’t have the authority to do to what Zac had just done—someone of higher rank would have made the call—he was sure the young REV would done the same for him.

  “What was that?” Keller yelled through the comm. “Did you—”

  “Yessir,” Zac interrupted. “Cut off, injured and moments from Twilight. I made the call.”

  There was silence on the line for a few tense seconds.

  “I concur. Action approved,” said Captain Keller. “Now, where are the rest of those yellow-skinned bastards? We may as well try to get some payback while were still in the shit.”

  For a minor op, it had been costly. Eventually, all the Qwin were killed and the comm station destroyed, but of the ninety deploying Marines, thirty had been killed and seventeen wounded. Even four from Keller’s medical team had been injured after they entered the active fight to clear the tunnels.

  Eventually, a path was found through the main tunnel back to the chamber were Jog had died, but as expected, there was nothing to recover, not even a dog-tag. The explosion wasn’t large, just enough to take out the REV and any alien troops within a fifteen foot circle.

  There had been four hundred Qwin in the tunnels; Jog was given credit for killing three hundred nine of them. That may have been generous, but no one complained. It went into his service record and was added to his total on a wall back on Earth honoring all the REV dead in this war.

  This was Zac’s eighteenth Final Call. As a senior REV, it wouldn’t be his last.

  Obs
ervable acceleration in healing is observed in all subjects on the NT-3a regimen. This was not expected, yet welcome. This phenomenon coincides with the trace amounts retained in the tissue. The R-class counter-agent appears to help in reducing levels following full activation. Still, too many deaths. My new assistant has been assigned to study the residual effect. He is a strange one.

  Journal Entry, Dec. 15, 2069, Dr. Clifford Slater

  6

  Three days later Zac met up with Manny Hernandez coming down a wide corridor within Officer’s Country aboard the starship, still sporting the white cast over his left arm. The cuts on his face had healed to just dull red lines on his dark skin, thanks in part to the healing power of the residual REV in his system. His arm would take only three weeks to heal completely.

  Zac’s escorting guards numbered only two this time, not because their ranks had been reduced, but because there would be plenty of others already on station for the upcoming meeting.

  While still twenty feet from the meeting room, Zac’s enhanced hearing picked up the ranting of a deep-voiced man echoing off the walls.

  “What the hell is happening to your unit, Captain Keller? First one of your REVs goes rogue during a Run, then another gets his ass shot up. And to top it off, the rogue REV then gives the command to blow up another of his team. Right now, this battle-carrier doesn’t have a single operational REV onboard. That’s unacceptable.”

  “We’re expediting another trio from Earth,” said another voice in the room. “ETA, fourteen days.”

  “In the meantime, the fucking Qwin are making the strongest push they ever have for an ES planet right here on number eight. That means a lot more Marines are going to die before we can get some REVs out in front.”

  “REV’s are Marines, too, general.”

  Zac recognized the voice as that of Arnie Patel. He could imagine the look he was getting from the general, even if no words could be heard. Zac rushed ahead to the door, hoping to run interference for his friend.

  One of the two guards at the door rapped strongly.

  “Enter!” said the gruff voice of General Simon ‘Mad-Dog’ McCabe.

  The guard opened the door and Zac and Manny entered. They stepped up to the too-tall officer and stood ridged at attention.

  “Sir, Gunnery Sergeant Murphy and Staff Sergeant Hernandez reporting as ordered.”

  The General’s face was flush from anger. He studied the two men before him and then nodded. “At ease, gentlemen. Please take seats at the table.”

  As Zac moved around to the other side of the long, mahogany-topped table, he noticed it was bolted to the floor, as where the two chairs on his side of the table. Those on the other side were freestanding and occupied by five people, not counting the towering senior officer, while another four men stood along the far bulkhead—along with four Marine guards. It seemed no one was taking chances with the two REVs in the room, even if one was in cast.

  Zac was disappointed to see that Olivia wasn’t with Patel. She said she’d try to be present, but it looked as though the moratorium on them meeting face-to-face was still on.

  Zac’s attention shifted when the general sat down across from him. McCabe was six-foot-six, which was far too tall for the passage- and doorways aboard a battle-carrier. He began his career with the infantry, fighting the Qwin in the early days on alien worlds with plenty of headroom. As he advanced through rank, however, more of his time was spent aboard starships. His nickname of mad-dog came not so much from his command style, but rather from the frequent temper tantrums he’d exhibit after banging his head into yet another hatchway or overhead. At six-foot-two, Zac had met his share of hatchways as well, but nothing like the irascible officer now glaring at him from across the table.

  “Care to fill me in about the events of three days past, gunny?” the general commanded.

  “Sir,” Captain Keller said. “I approved the decision—”

  “Retroactively, captain,” McCabe barked.

  “Sir, ordering the death of a fellow REV is not something I do lightly,” Zac said. He didn’t feel like he had to explain himself, but was being asked to do so. “Corporal Gains was already dead in my opinion. I only wished to make his death count for a little more by taking a few extra Qwin with him.”

  McCabe pursed his lips. “I understand that, gunny. I know it wasn’t an easy decision, but one that was necessary. I’m just frustrated with the loss of a good REV. When added to the other deficiencies of your team, I’m thinking about the loss of Marine’s live that will result from those deficiencies. I apologize for my outburst. It wasn’t personal.”

  “General, I feel the same. And in light of the Qwin offensive on ES-8, I would like to get operational as soon as possible.”

  McCabe looked over at a tall, slender man in summer khakis, sporting a full head of silver-gray hair that was much too long for a combat Marine. “Dr. Cross and I arrived about the same time aboard the Olympus, but from separate directions. He hasn’t briefed me on his findings.” He frowned at the scientist. “He seems to making a mystery out of it.”

  Colonel David Cross and Zac had met three times in the past, the first being fifteen years ago during the workup to graduation from REV training. Zac was amazed to see that the man appeared to have aged very little. He was still lean and ruggedly handsome. Only the hair hinted at his true age of fifty-six. As the lead scientist and inheritor of the NT-4 work done by the famous Doctor Clifford Slater, he would make a perfect recruiting poster for the program, if he were a REV. Instead, he was a geek in a lab coat, constantly working to improve his magic elixir.

  Cross smiled. “I apologize, general. It was not my intention to be secretive, but we were still refining our datasets when we left Earth. Eighteen days in transit meant we still had a lot of work to do on the way here. It was either work along the way or postpone the announcement.”

  “What announcement?” asked both Zac and Dr. Patel in unison.

  Cross looked around the room. “I see that very few here have an in-depth understanding of NT-4 and the program surrounding its use, so I would like to take a moment to set the stage for what I will say later. It will add context to the announcement. Do I have your permission, general?”

  “It took me two weeks to get here, doctor. And now that I am you have a captive audience. But don’t take too long or make it too boring.”

  Zac nodded to himself. That sounded like something he might say. Maybe the general wasn’t so bad after all….

  Doctor Cross focused his attention on Zac.

  “I must say, Sergeant Murphy, I feel like we’re old friends, and I suspect you wouldn’t be surprised to learn that we have a whole unit back at the Center devoted to you, and you alone.”

  “I figured that after all these years someone had to take notice.”

  “And we have. It’s a little known fact, but we collect data on every REV and every Run they take. This data is then categorized and sorted to rate each operative based on this information. Needless to say, you are far and away the top REV in the program.”

  “Excuse me, sir, but what does that mean exactly?” Zac asked, growing weary of the show taking place. “I’m juiced up and pointed in a direction. I have no control over what I do and cannot consciously use any special skills I may have. I kill aliens by the truckload and only survive because of the toughness of my REV-enhanced skin, my strength and heightened senses. I’m like every other REV in that regard. So how do I rate higher than Sergeant Hernandez, for example?”

  “That’s a fair question, gunny,” said Dr. Cross. “And as I continue with my presentation, I hope to answer it. May I?”

  The guy sure is a polite bastard, Zac thought.

  “Please, sir, continue.”

  “As I was saying, as you continued on your phenomenal tenure as a REV, we began to take note and assigned a team of specialists to assess your condition and accomplishments. We needed to answer two questions. One: Are you unique in your abilities and longevity. And t
wo: Are you a precursor to what all long-term NT-4 users will become? The data was stacking up, and honestly, if this recent event hadn’t occurred, I was getting ready to pull you from the field and bring you back to Earth for more study.”

  “What did you find?” asked Dr. Arnie Patel.

  “Up to a month ago, all we could definitively say was that Zac is unique.”

  “A month?” said Captain Keller. “That was well after the Run.”

  “Yes it was, captain,” Cross said, seeming to enjoy the game of suspense he was playing. “Let me summarize what happened during and after the Run, and then attempt to link the cause and effect of both.

  “Gunnery Sergeant Murphy performed remarkably well during the Run, so much so that he exceeded record kill numbers, as well as distance penetrated into enemy territory. That alone would have got our attention, especially since this was accomplished by the most-senior REV in the program. One would think that as a person grows older, and the more wear and tear the body sustains, abilities would to diminish over time. But not so for our indestructible gunnery sergeant. All our data showed an increase in ability and a strengthening of his systems over the past several Runs. Normally, we would have accepted this information on face value, believing that long-term use of NT-4 would cause others to achieve the same results. But that doesn’t seem to be happening. Sergeant Murphy is the exception, not the rule.”

  Cross stopped and turned to an assistant leaning against the wall behind him. The man handed him a stack of thin datapads. Cross passed them out around the table, including to Zac and Manny. They activated automatically as Cross began to scan through the pages.

  “Let me go over some basic data about NT-4, some of which you may already know but will be essential as I go forward.” He highlighted a section on the datapad.

  “NT-4 is often referred to as a super drug, something able to turn ordinary men into super men. Unfortunately, that is not the case. All NT-4 does is trigger the body to do what it does naturally, but at much higher levels and efficiency. We call this the cascading effect. When even a small trace of the drug is introduced into the body, this cascading begins. The problem we found in the early days was that once the cascading began there was no way to stop it. Even if no additional NT-4 was introduced, the body continued to spiral out of control. In the days before Twilight, I have watched men literally explode from the pressure building up inside. And even with Twilight—along with its cousin RD-9—the body couldn’t survive the stresses placed upon it. It was later discovered that a massive dose of NT-4 would help stabilize the cascading effect, but only for a period of ten to twelve minutes. After that, no amount of NT-4—or even Twilight—would help. The subject would continue to cascade, resulting in a very messy death. That is why an activated REV can only operate for a finite period, with twelve minutes being the absolute maximum safe duration.”