Syndicate Wars: Fault Line (Seppukarian Book 3)

by Kyle Noe

  “Even if that thing works, how’s it gonna help you?” Calee asked, looking over. “I mean, we’re close enough to kiss.”

  There was recognition on the Guardsmen’s faces as they swallowed and stepped back. It appeared as if they hadn’t contemplated this fact at all. They windmilled their arms, waving the resistance fighters on. “Get going! You’re on your own from here on out!” the bearded Guardsman shouted.

  The SUVs jolted off, driving down a decline that led through the outskirts of Salt Lake City. Luke gaped out his window, peering at the Salt Lake Temple and the Utah State Capitol which lay partially in ruins, a victim of a Syndicate attack in the earliest days of the invasion. Aside from several stretches of cityscape, the rest of the city looked remarkably unblemished. The SUVs slowed, then stopped, caught at the tail end of a backup, a line of vehicles that were threading through one of the relief camps toward another checkpoint where armed guards were doing inspections.

  Luke caught looks from the refugees milling about outside. Hundreds, maybe thousands of people from other cities and those that came down from the stony hills for food and water in the belief that they would remain unmolested as long as they stayed within the city limits. Luke saw desperation in the faces of the refugees, as diverse as any city he’d ever visited. People of every background. All seemingly united in sorrow and loss.

  The SUV drove forward a few hundred feet, past the tents, ramshackle buildings, FEMA trucks, and little stands where people were cooking over open fires. Luke saw water being offloaded from a flat-bed truck and sacks of food being distributed to women and spindly children. A few dogs roamed the camps, fighting over the remains of a sack that had dropped to the ground and spilled open.

  “We’re gonna be here a while,” Calee said, pointing at the line of cars.

  “Let’s gather some intel,” Luke replied.

  Luke and Calee exited the SUV and moved through the camp. Luke closed his eyes and just listened for a few seconds. It was a trick a lifer had taught him back in prison. Something he advised Luke to do the first moment he stepped into the yard each day. It would allow him to take the pulse of his surroundings, to be able to spot trouble, disturbances in the air before they occurred. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary and so he and Calee shuttled down a walkway that bisected clusters of tents and shacks. They passed a small market and places where food hawkers were grilling meat across open fires while men played cards or shot dice.

  Luke spotted what appeared to be a bar, a shack with a sign nailed above the doorway that said “The Fourth Turning.” They sidled up to the bar, which consisted of four wooden doors propped up on cinderblocks. The joint was peopled by locals and a pod of resistance fighters who recognized Calee. Luke was introduced to the fighters, four thick-necked grunts named Casolaro, Hastings, Lombardi, and a one-armed bruiser named David Crowley. Luke and Calee did a shot, asking about the conditions in the camp and the road ahead. The fighters mentioned stories about the aliens being witnessed out in the desert, constructing what appeared to be bases. For what reason, nobody seemed to know.

  They left the bar and retraced their steps. Calee took in the sights and sounds, appearing moved by a delegation of dirty-faced children who were enjoying a puppet show in the shadow of what looked like a crashed Syndicate glider.

  “Isn’t there anything we can do for them?” Calee asked, leaning back over her seat.

  “The only thing that matters is finding a way to stop the Syndicate,” Luke replied.

  “Then why the hell are we going to Wyoming?”

  He didn’t respond, turning instead to the people outside. He watched a group of doctors and nurses amble past, masks and respirators on, carrying sacks of meds, shadowed by several National Guardsmen. Luke lifted his head and a strong wind funneled between the tents. There was something in the air. The camp’s odor was a mix of burning food and sweat and the ammonia-tinged funk of fear. Luke could sense a change in the rhythms, the pulse of the camp. It wasn’t bad here yet, but in a few weeks? When the food and other supplies ran out it would not be pretty.

  His vision darted between the refugees and stopped on a young man who traded a glance with him. The man was standing, warming his hands over one of the open fires. He was striking, with strong features and broad shoulders. He was dressed in jeans and a flannel shirt and his hands … why were his hands so close to the fire.

  Luke’s fear meter began rising. The striking man melted back into the crowd and then a particle of dirt made Luke’s eyes tear. When he squinted back, the man was gone.

  “Get in the car,” Luke said.

  Calee stared at him, eyes narrowed. “What? Why?”

  “Just do it.”

  The pair moved with alacrity back toward the SUV which was closer to the checkpoint. They slid inside and Luke looked back out his open window and spotted something.

  There was a dog pacing.

  A large German shepherd.

  The creature’s back was arched. It was pissed, or scared—Luke couldn’t tell which. The barks turned shrill and Luke watched it blindly dash through the crowd. In seconds the dog had been joined by another dog, and then two more and Luke was gesturing for the driver of his SUV to step on it.

  “Get moving,” Luke said, softly at first.

  The driver, a female warrior named Anne, caught Luke’s eyes in the rearview mirror.

  “There’s the little problem of the bottleneck,” Anne said, gesturing at the cars ahead, idling in front of the checkpoint.

  “Go around them,” Luke said.

  “Are you nuts?” Anne asked.

  The dogs were fighting outside now, their jaws snapping.

  Luke turned back and watched them struggling with their prey.

  The man with striking features.

  The dogs had him cornered and now the other refugees were backing up, giving the man a wide berth. Something was definitely, horribly, fucking wrong.

  “Go!” Luke shouted, to Anne.

  One of the dogs snapped out at the man, tearing a flap of flesh from his hand. The liquid that poured from the wound was whiter than bleached sugar.

  Luke lurched over the seat and pressed down on Anne’s knee as the SUV shot forward. Anne shrieked and monkeyed the wheel, swinging it to the right as Luke looked back and—

  WHUMP-BOOM!

  The man with striking features vanished in a blast that shattered the SUV’s rear windshield, lifting the machine several feet off the ground. Bedlam ensued, dozens, maybe hundreds of refugees lay scattered like seeds from a shattered gourd. Whistles were blown and sirens echoed and somebody began firing an automatic weapon.

  Soon the refugees were panicking, stampeding and the SUV rocketed forward, driving past the startled refugees. The pavement turned bumpy and more explosions sounded from behind and a whining sound filled Luke’s ears. The checkpoint was looming in the distance, a section of fence covered in wire and scrap metal.

  “RUN THE FUCKING THING!” Luke screamed.

  The SUV accelerated to startle the Guardsmen, who dove out of the way. The machine pistoned through the checkpoint, driving through and past it. Luke looked back to see one of the other SUVs following, the last one in the line was visible, smoking, having been torched by the blast from the homicide bomber.

  Calee turned to Luke who was fishing the shards of back windshield from his head. “That’s why we’re going to Wyoming,” Luke said, softly. “To stop the bastards from doing things like that.”

  Luke leaned back, feeling the blood dribble down the back of his neck from a series of surface cuts. Calee called out to him, offering aid, but he waved her off. He’d live … at least for a while longer. He rubbed his ears which continued to whine from the blast and then closed his eyes as the SUVs rumbled out of Salt Lake City, headed toward Shiloh.

  9

  The Descent

  As the glider approached the frozen asteroid called Hygiea, Quinn and the others snapped out of their thoughts and straight into unease. Their de
meanor turned tense as the others slid on their helmets and readied themselves to be propelled down toward the asteroid’s surface. They’d inspected and reinspected their armor and gear, and activated the metal studs on their combat boots for traction on the asteroid’s icy surface.

  Quinn stood alongside Cody and Eli, inspecting the battle drones that were to be dropped down with the Marines via a self-powered, cubed shaped equipment pod—another marvel of alien technology. Cody’s expression was dark as he scanned the drones.

  “They’ve still got some bugs,” he said.

  “That’s what happens when you use equipment destined for the scrapyard,” Quinn replied.

  “We can make it work,” Eli said encouragingly.

  “Not remotely, we can’t,” Cody replied.

  Eli’s eyebrows converged. “What exactly does that mean?”

  Cody pointed at the last section of armor and a final battle helmet that were visible in an alcove. “It means we need someone on the ground to pilot these things.”

  Eli pointed to himself, and Cody and Quinn nodded.

  “You ever parachuted, Eli?” Quinn asked.

  Eli shook his head. “How hard can it be? Just like swimming, only through the air.”

  Quinn suppressed a smirk and grabbed a battle helmet and section of armor for Eli. Cody stood and gestured to the other warriors, pointing at a nearby window, which provided an excellent view of the asteroid.

  “There it is, ladies and menfolk,” Cody said, pointing to the asteroid. “Hygiea.”

  Quinn stared out the window, taking in the asteroid which was colored a dark yellowish, almost sulphur-like but streaked with green, the result of what was sizable amounts of chlorine and chlorine dioxide in its atmosphere. Cody had described how, because the chlorine possessed a high boiling point, the gas in the upper atmosphere was liquefied, fell only to be warmed again and turned back into a gas, like some kind of toxic death loop. The surface of the asteroid was varied, half of it concealed by a kind of ice, the other half covered in deserts and mountain ranges heavy with dunes of sodium chloride and rust-colored hydrochloric acid.

  “If I had all the power in the Universe, that is not the place I’d choose for my summer home,” Milo said.

  “It’s actually the perfect place,” Cody replied. “The conditions on the surface are brutal, but it’s mineral rich and the Syndicate has a really neat way of extracting stuff. They drop down thousands of these pods filled with self-replicating machines. As soon as they hit the ground the machines get to work, scooping up material, heating it with Fresnel lenses. They remove the volatile gases from the soil and separate components into a material harder than steel. They can even make plastic out of moisture and volatile carbon components, and a ceramic substrate from superheated asteroid dirt. Then they use all of this to build more machines, and more robots and more weapons.”

  “Tell us more, Mister Science,” Renner said, mockingly.

  Cody flipped him a middle finger. “I’m just saying the aliens have found a way to create a ridiculously large and efficient manufacturing complex on a lifeless planet. You gotta appreciate that.”

  “We will,” Hayden said, looking back. “We’re gonna appreciate the shit out of that, and then we’re gonna grab what we came for and blow the shit outta that alien crap.”

  Quinn helped Eli into his armor and helmet and then powered up her HUD in full, watching reams of imagery and information blur past, the vital statistics followed by shots of the frozen ground below, coordinates and vectoring, illuminated paths and avenues of attack, and thermal imagery of everyone within a kilometer of the landing zone. The plan was a rather simple one. They would space dive down onto the asteroid and advance across what amounted to a frozen lake before picking their way through a stretch of jagged mountains where the temporal totem was supposed to be located. Quinn was relieved to see no apparent heat signatures anywhere within range of the LZ. God willing, they’d have an uneventful dive down to the surface.

  As if reading her mind, she heard Milo mutter through the HUD, “all is quiet.”

  “You’re getting me nervous,” Renner said. “This looks like it’s gonna be easy.”

  Too easy, Quinn thought to herself.

  “Remember that shake and back op we pulled on that island in the Philippines?” Milo asked.

  “Bohol Island,” Quinn blurted out, remembering the amphibious landing.

  “It was like that too,” Milo said. “Nothing at the beach, but as soon as we hit the treeline, those bastards came out of the woodwork.”

  “Just because the water’s calm, doesn’t mean there ain’t any alligators,” Renner said.

  “Not the time for voicing your fears,” Giovanni said. “Focus on the end zone.” But he kept stealing glances at the readouts, looking for signs of danger.

  “All talk,” Hayden said, and chuckled at Giovanni.

  Giovanni smirked. “Somebody’s gotta keep up appearances.”

  “Can’t argue with that,” Hayden said.

  A hushed silence fell over the glider as the warriors waited for the signal to begin the assault. Quinn felt the pressure of the descent and heard the whine of the craft’s engines. The warriors were jolted as the glider dipped and dropped, Quinn pinned in place by the g-forces as a klaxon sounded.

  Quinn glanced to her right, trading looks with a young resistance fighter who was trembling.

  “They say we’re gonna hit the Syndicate head on,” the young fighter said.

  “Most likely,” she replied. “Tip of the spear as they say.”

  “I heard about you guys. You’ve been with them and fought them, right?”

  Quinn nodded.

  “They say if the aliens’ drones catch you, they’ll kill, burn, and digest you.”

  “In that order if you’re lucky,” Quinn replied, with a chuckle.

  The fighter removed his helmet. He looked like he was ready to vomit.

  “Relax. We won’t lose many in the initial assault,” she said.

  “No?” the fighter replied, a hopeful look on his face.

  “Nah, no more than eight or nine out of ten of us.”

  Renner heard this and held up a hand. “Go in with dog tags, and come out with toe tags, baby!”

  The young fighter barfed as Renner cackled. “Pop that cherry!”

  The klaxon sounded for the second time and Quinn glanced outside. She could see the glider plunging into the dark turbulence that wreathed Hygiea.

  Hayden stood and flung looks at the other Marines. “Get ready, Devil Dogs, it’s time!” he shouted. “Keep your aim steady and remember, pain does not mean you have a reason to be afraid. It means you’re dead, so you might as well take some scuds out with you!”

  The Marines and resistance fighters answered with a resounding unified shout. The warriors reached and strapped on their individual parachute packs, ‘Raptor Chutes,’ Cody had called them. Parachutes secured, the warriors stood in their harnesses, staring down at the asteroid as the glider did a graceful arc over the landing zone.

  Red lights on the ceiling blitzed to life. Quinn tensed, eyes closed, her lips silently reviewing the air order of battle, watching the quivering hands of the resistance fighters and then—

  WHOOSH!

  The drop-doors under Quinn and the others opened and the harnesses and concealed micro-motors shotgunned everyone into the inky blackness of Hygiea’s upper atmosphere. The darkness was disorienting for a moment as Quinn and the others fell away from the glider, dropping like rockets, followed by the metal cube filled with the battle drones.

  Quinn plunged straight down, careening through the sky, scissoring her legs and arms for control. In seconds, she was a model of aerodynamic perfection, rocketing by at six hundred miles per hour, the friction from her descent creating an orange hue around her armored exo-armor.

  The digital readout on her HUD altimeter lit up as she hit terminal velocity. Some of the other Marines were showing off, crisscrossing between each
other as Hayden barked commands, ordering everyone to bring their hands close to their sides. Some of the Marines powered on their nitrogen gas thrusters, blasting down into position.

  Some of the others, particularly Eli, struggled, but eventually were able to assume the proper locations, going into “Full Delta” dives, arms pressed to sides, head down, legs up. The group sliced by, space-diving toward the ground. They cut through the darkest part of the asteroid’s atmosphere, falling into a radical, downward descent, their speed continuing to build, Quinn listening to the howl of the wind as she plummeted toward the ground.

  Giovanni watched the readouts for the others’ vitals despite having to maneuver his own descent. So far, all was well. He reminded everyone that it was essential to monitor the conditions outside upon landing, along with the viability of the micro-generator in their armor that would supply oxygen to them while on the asteroid.

  The warriors sky-surfed toward solid ground, riding the wind currents when there was a concussive blast, a sonic BOOM! which signified they’d shattered the sound barrier all at once.

  Quinn’s visor was fogged as she drifted through yellowish-green clouds, the ground below visible. She smacked the comms device on her helmet, which was often wonky, particularly at this altitude and rate of speed. She could hear Giovanni shouting. “BE READY TO PULL CORDS ON MY CALL!”

  Quinn reached up for a metal ring on the top of her ‘chute, the ground only a few hundred feet below. She took it all in, the landing zone, the frozen lake that ended at what appeared to be a sweep of desert, the vast horizon demarcated by a towering rock formation that was barely visible—the location of the temporal totem. Still there were no heat signatures anywhere in sight, no evidence of the Syndicate, and so she allowed herself the slightest of smiles, and squeezed the metal ring. That’s when a burst of red appeared on her HUD and the first missile detonated, vaporizing one of the resistance fighters, mid-air.

  10

  The Landing