by Weston Ochse
While the exterior of my new EXO was brash white, the interior was red and lined with better cushioning than I remembered. The outer covering alternated layers of Kevlar and titanium, bonded together to protect both the wearer and the grounding web. Internally the suit had hardened electronics for video feeds, voice communication, targeting, night vision, sound amplification/dampening and vital sign monitoring, along with heating, cooling and an air rebreather system with CO2 scrubbers, all powered by extremely light, high-energy rechargeable batteries. And I was right about the extra size. Technicians had managed to double the battery life, allowing the suit to keep engaged for forty-eight hours.
All systems were controlled by eye movements, through an internal HUD system with Gaze technology, or remotely from base as a backup. I gaze-flicked the status of all the other EXOs and was pleased with how quickly the information was at hand. Then I brought up Charlemagne’s feed and checked real time what he could see in the visual spectrum as well as radar. Other than debris along the ground, there was nothing within miles.
I returned attention to my own suit as I assessed the weapons suite.
Each EXO had three primary weapon systems.
The integral rocket launcher (IRL) was mounted over the left shoulder on rails, so as to rotate it back out of the way or bring it forward to firing position when needed. The standard payload was thirty Hydra rockets with air-burst warheads set to detonate at a range determined before launch by the suit’s internal targeting system. Missiles were free-flight after launch, with a hardened internal timer for detonation. This system was designed to engage alien drones at maximum to medium targeting range. If need be, it would engage the Russians in much the same way.
The XM214 was the EXO’s primary attack armament. The new model had 500 more rounds and these were all white phosphorous.
Of course, not every situation caused for a range weapon. There’d been more than one occasion where I’d felt the need or the situation had necessitated me going medieval on their asses. For that I used the harmonic blade. A meter long and sixteen centimeters wide, TF OMBRA’s harmonic blade vibrated at ultrasonic frequencies, making it thousands of times more effective at slicing through armored opponents than a normal blade. The weapon was made from Stellite to help withstand the vibrational forces as well as any environmental extremes an OMBRA grunt might encounter, and the vibration was generated in the hilt by an electrically isolated system powered by a high energy battery.
Yeah, being an EXO driver didn’t suck. I’d last worn one in Dodger Stadium, on my way to the Hollywood Hive. I’d forgotten how I felt while wearing the suit. The power and protection, the servos allowing full range of motion, and more. I flexed the missile launcher, then brought forward the machine gun. Being in an EXO was like being a tank with two legs instead of tread. I wanted to shoot something. I wanted to break something. I stood there for a few seconds grinning like an idiot.
Then I saw Merlin trying to get my attention.
I turned to him and he backed up several feet. I realized my weapon’s systems were deployed and retracted them. Now instead of looking like some sort of robotic dreadnaught, I was merely an imposing nine foot tall mechanized warrior. Merlin, who was actually a few inches taller than me, seemed like a child beside me.
“What am I supposed to do? Come along?” he asked, eyeing me speculatively.
I toggled the public address system. “Get on the radio and see if you can find places where we might hole up in case we lose this position.” Then another thought hit me. “You might also ask if any of the Yupik here might have taken any souvenirs from the wreckage. Might make our job easier.”
He nodded and went back inside.
I could tell he wanted to be part of the action, but without an EXO he’d be more of a liability than anything else.
Two minutes later, the four of us were standing outside the plane.
Nance launched the winged UAV and sent it south at an elevation of two thousand feet. I flick-gazed the feed into my window, then reduced it so I could later access it with ease. Then I shot the quad-copter straight up five hundred feet and set it to center above my EXO. I checked the feed and saw the four of us, the plane, and the crew chief and his assistant manning the 50 cal machine guns. I was intrigued by my ability to see them through my visor as well as through the feed. I wondered how I was going to be able to manage it.
I spoke briefly with the pilot, then had Hero Team go four abreast with thirty meters of spacing between each of us. Then we broke into a loping run towards the debris field. The plan was to get in and find as much loot as we could prior to contact with the Russians. We had roughly thirty minutes before they were in contact range of our missiles. It was hardly enough time, but it would have to do.
Nance was to my left and the twins were to my right. We stayed in line as we entered the debris field. If OMBRA wanted pieces of spacecraft, there’d be no problem. It was as if there’d been a sub-orbital party, because confetti-sized pieces of space craft were all around us. I doubted that OMBRA wanted us to get out a dustpan, so we continued inward, searching for something larger. And we were gradually rewarded.
We stopped at an odd piece roughly the size of a Volkswagen, but shaped like it had been torn from a larger piece. I had the team stop and we gathered around it. What I’d found curious in the smaller pieces was magnified in this piece. There was a liquid quality about the metal. Even in the flat grey sun of the Arctic, multiple hues of color could be seen in the wreckage. I reached down and touched a section with the gloved forefinger of the EXO and gasped as the colors converged on the point where I’d touched it. I jerked my hand back and the colors disseminated again. Then I touched it in another place and watched the colors come together.
“What do you make of this?” Nance asked.
“Not up on my alien space craft engineering skills,” I responded. “To me this is pure science fiction.”
“More like science fact,” Pearl said. “It’s right here in front of you.”
I nodded but couldn’t help but recognize the surrealness of the situation. Two years ago I had been in Afghanistan fighting Taliban and thinking how surreal that was, and how I’d never imagined being in that situation when I was going to high school in San Pedro where my biggest fear was being jumped by members of the 8th Street Angels. Now, standing in the Arctic Circle and staring at pieces of an alien aircraft while both Russians and Cray were bearing down on us, I felt that it was an honest thing to say that I wouldn’t be surprised if I saw Santa Claus in the next few minutes, feeding his reindeer and pushing his elves to make more wooden toys for the good kids of the world.
I looked around. The debris field was miles long. Searching it this way would take hours.
I checked in with Charlemagne. He was still on station, but reported visual contact from the UAV. I toggled the image and saw for the first time the Russians who were coming for us. And what I saw wasn’t at all what I’d expected.
A T-80 tank led the convoy. A covered truck carrying soldiers took up the rear. But what held my attention were the three middle trucks. All three were flatbeds carrying three odd red and black metallic shapes. It took a moment for me to realize what I was looking at because they looked like giant metallic spiders with their legs tucked beneath them; legs folded under a two-sectioned body. The larger back section had wide ventilation slats while the smaller front section sported a reflective blister.
“Bots,” Pearl said. “Those are giant spider bots. I saw them in Escape to the Stars a few years ago.”
I turned to her, not understanding the reference, and she laughed. “It’s a game where Earth is destroyed by nuclear war and the survivors must got into space to survive. One of the options is to travel to Alpha Centauri which is controlled by an alien race that uses spider bots as not only a mode of transportation, but also to combat giant roly polys that spit acid.”
I gaze-flicked back to the UAV feed and nodded. “So these are the Russian equivalent o
f EXOs. Charlemagne, keep your eyes on the feed and see if you can discern any armaments.”
“Do you mean besides the eight metal arms?” he asked.
“Yeah, besides the eight metal arms.”
“WILCO.”
Seeing the UAV feed gave me an idea. I gaze-flicked to the quadcopter’s controls. It wasn’t much help to us now, so I sent it in front of us at alternating forty five degree angles, trying to cover as much area and as quickly as possible. I estimated that the convoy was only ten minutes from Charlemagne’s position. I couldn’t let him sit out there alone, but as a first strike option, I liked having him there.
We continued forward, this time at full speed, which was thirty-seven miles an hour—nearly double the speed of an average sprinter. Using the quadcopter to search instead of our own faculties, all we did was follow behind.
The deeper into the field we went, the larger pieces we saw. I began seeing what could only be body parts. They weren’t identifiable, but I’d been to enough IED explosions to recognize what a piece of organic tissue looked like.
Just then Nance went down beside me.
I halted and spun, my radar searching for a target. But the sky and the ground were empty. Then what had taken him down?
Nance groaned through the intercom as he slowly pulled himself to his feet.
“What happened?” I asked.
I saw the embarrassment on his face and knew even before he said it.
“Tripped. Was watching dual feeds instead of where I was going.”
I checked his vitals and the EXO system. Everything seemed to be one hundred percent.
“Then let’s go.”
I turned and was soon at a sprint again. The twins hadn’t bothered to stop and were far ahead, but they weren’t moving. Nance and I both slowed, then stopped. What I saw there left me stunned. It wasn’t exactly human, but it had human-like features. It was missing an arm and part of a leg, but was otherwise mostly intact. It wore a silvery, form-fitting suit with some sort of insignia over the left breast. It had five fingers on its remaining hand. Its remaining foot was encased in a form-fitting boot, but if the hand had five fingers I presumed that the foot would have five toes. In fact, it looked very human except for the length. Nearly the size of an EXO in height, it was as though a normal human body had been stretched impossibly long. The face had the requisite human features, but wasn’t anywhere near the symmetry one would expect. An eye was missing, replaced by some sort of mechanical gadget. I also noted a piece of metal sticking out of the side of its neck at an odd angle. Probably killed it before it ever hit the ground.
“Nance, take this and RTB,” I said, meaning return to base.
He knelt down and stared at it, but made no move to touch it.
“What’s wrong?”
“It’s just that—this is the first alien I’ve ever seen that looks human. I thought they’d be different.”
“I’m no scientist,” I said, “But look at the Cray. They’re bipedal just like we are.”
“But don’t they also have wings?” Earl said.
“They do, but so do birds. My point is that there’s probably a similarity in alien body structure based on the sort of planets they were created on.” I tried to channel Spock, who I knew would be talking about star classes, planet classes, and carbon-based life forms, but I’d maxed out my science knowledge. “All I know is that we’re supposed to bring the remains back to HQ, and here we have some remains.”
Nance gently lifted the corpse and got to his feet. He glanced at me, then turned and ran back towards our base, the C-130.
I looked out over the plain and saw more bodies. The twins and I jogged past several until we came to one that was definitely a human male. His proportions were exact, plus one arm had a tattoo of the United States Marine Corps Globe and Anchor.
“That’s not something you see every day,” Pearl said.
“I think we now know what they meant by human aliens,” I said. “How do you think he got up there?”
“Maybe he was captured,” Earl said. “Could have been a test subject.”
I didn’t think that was the case, but kept my speculations to myself. Although he wasn’t wearing the skin-tight silver suit the long man was wearing, he wasn’t wearing a uniform I recognized. Black pants ended in a hem cinched above black laceless boots. His top had been mostly ripped away, but it seemed to be some sort of black, form-fitting antiballistic armor, accentuating the pectoral muscles. A black metal band circled his neck, reminding me of an old original Star Trek episode called The Gamesters of Triskelion that had thralls competing against each other in a gladiatorial arena. I only remembered it because of the character of Shahna who had long green hair and had a skimpy silver bikini. Is that what this marine was? A thrall? We needed to be sure to examine the metal around his neck.
“Let’s take this one, too. Hero Four, you can do the honors.”
Earl gave a half-assed salute, then picked up the body using one hand. He threw it over a shoulder. “Now what.”
“RTB.”
He turned and sprinted back.
“What now?” Pearl asked.
At that moment, Charlemagne broke into the feed. He sounded unusually happy. “Here they come.” Then came the sound of his rockets and machine gun firing.
The proper function of man is to live, not to exist. I shall not waste my days in trying to prolong them. I shall use my time.
Jack London
CHAPTER TWELVE
HERO THREE AND I grabbed the biggest pieces of debris we could get our hands on and headed back towards base with all haste. Although I kept my focus on my path ahead of me, I gaze-flicked to the circling UAV and watched as a flood of rockets left Charlemagne and arched into the convoy.
He’d sent most of them against the tank. Because of the T-80’s reactive Chobham armor, he’d sent only a third of the Hydra rockets against the turret. What we really needed were Sabot rounds; then again, the EXOs were designed to fight aliens, not fellow humans. I watched as each exploded, but they did little damage to the tank. But the remaining ten were targeting the tank’s tracks and exploded upon impact, sending pieces of tread flying in all directions. The tank listed, then slewed to the left as a track wheel disintegrated.
“Get out of there!” I roared. Although I hadn’t ordered him to attack, he’d made the right decision. But now that he’d gotten their attention, he’d be in a heap of trouble the moment they recovered from the shock and awe of his initial attack.
“Just a little more,” he murmured, his voice as calm as if he were baking chocolate chip cookies rather than single-handedly taking on a Russian convoy carrying spidertanks.
I felt a tickle in the back of my mind, both familiar and strange. I instantly thought it might be Thompson and reached out. Is that you? Thompson? But there was no reply and the tickle was gone.
I continued to run, watching Charlemagne’s white EXO and how it stood out against the gray and green of the flat tundra. He began to traverse backwards as another six rockets fired from his shoulder. Then he began to lay down machine gun fire in clean ten round bursts towards the rear vehicle.
My gaze tore from him to the spidertanks, which were all coming to terrible life, their black legs uncurling, their red segmented bodies raising. But then all three on the first flatbed exploded as the six missiles ate into them. Leg pieces flew in all directions, many three or more meters long. I watched as several of these pierced the earth like giant spears.
Of the six remaining spider bots, three tore off the rear flatbed and towards the back of the convoy, while the other three tore towards Charlemagne, moving impossibly fast, their eight legs manipulating in perfect arachnid precision.
He fired six more rockets at the oncoming bots.
Suddenly the tank fired. Although heeled over and off track, it must have been able to get its barrel to traverse enough to get a firing solution on Charlemagne. He juked left and the 125mm round soared past and disappeare
d in the distant tundra.
I gaze-flicked to his point of view and almost wished I hadn’t because it looked for all the world like giant spiders were bearing down on me… him. Suddenly round discs unfolded from the front of each spider, very similar to a dish antenna. I couldn’t discern what they were, but within seconds, every rocket exploded in midair. The bots were momentarily hidden by the explosions, then they were rushing through smoke and fire.
My point of view spun dizzyingly as Charlemagne turned and began running for his life.
I flick-gazed to the UAV and watched as the bots gave chase. Luckily, the EXOs seemed to be a fraction faster than the bots because Charlemagne was increasing the distance between them.
A full squad of twelve Russian Special Forces had piled out of the rear vehicle and gathered behind the three remaining spider bots. They were hunched down and seemed to be waiting to move out. Several of them looked into the air, spotting the UAV. Soon, all of them opened fire. My viewpoint lasted three more seconds before the UAV exploded, ending whatever reconnaissance advantage I had.
The C-130 began to grow in the distance. “Hero One. Deploy three hundred meters at ninety degrees and get down. Remain there until ordered.”
I saw an EXO peel away from the plane and move towards my right.
“WILCO,” Nance said.
“Hero Four. Deploy three hundred meters at one hundred and eighty degrees and get down. Remain there until ordered.”
“You mean you want me to lay down?” Earl asked.
