by Richard Fox
“What else can this thing do?” he asked.
+Don’t have a rail gun installed…that’s probably good, all things considered. Right thigh.+
A hatch opened and a hilt popped out.
“Sweet, this that same glowy thing that Marshal Roland has?” Ely snatched it off while he was still moving and tested its weight. It was hefty for such a small device.
+Ibarran toys. You’ve got a real weapon, a MEWS. Imagine a sword.+
A tube of dark-gray material snapped out of the hilt, then locked into the shape of a sword without a hilt.
“How about an…”
The MEWS reformed into a wood-chopping axe.
+Action front.+
Ely came around a building and slid to a stop. A strange-looking wall just taller than his suit formed a semicircle against the wall. Its wide, irregular panels overlapped like scales.
“What the hell?”
Rakka hooted and climbed up from the other side, firing at him. Ely hit the top of the wall with his gauss cannon, exploding a Rakka and blowing out a hunk of the wall. Green fluid spurted out of the gash and leaked down the side.
The barricade shifted. The end against the wall pulled away and a mass of different-sized eyes locked on to Ely.
+That’s new.+
Plasma fields ignited over the great worm’s head and it struck at Ely. He leaped aside, the heat from the plasma screens sending pain down his flank as it clipped him. The worm slammed against the ground, the plasma evaporating concrete into steam.
Ely struck out with the MEWS and a fishhook pierced the armor scales. The worm jerked Ely off his feet and carried him along as it crashed through garages.
+Good idea.+
“You think I planned this?” Ely pressed against the rampaging creature as it tried to buck him off, slamming Ely against the ceiling.
+Brace your left heel against the ground. Now!+
Ely swung his feet forward and a drill bit popped out of his left heel. He slammed it to the ground and an anchor shot deep into the floor. The MEWS tugged against Ely’s grip, but he held firm. The worm kept going and the hook in its flesh ripped its scales open. Dark-green blood splashed out onto the ground, the worm’s momentum carrying it forward and disemboweling it at the same time.
The worm’s tail snapped back, then slammed into Ely. He went tumbling like a barrel down a hill and stopped in a small depression.
Ely’s HUD blinked.
“Ely, can you hear me?” Roland asked.
“Sure can.” Ely tried to sit up, but his suit wouldn’t respond. A Rakka jumped onto his chest and brandished a spear up into the air. The alien let out a war cry then stabbed at Ely’s breastplate. The tip bit him, but not deep.
“There are breaches all through the city. I’ve got troops heading to you, but you need to keep them bottled up. There are too many civilians down there with you,” Roland said.
More Rakka massed around Ely, stabbing at him with spears, scratching his optics.
“I’ve got their attention. Not sure what I can do next. Little help would be appreciated,” Ely said.
“Son, you’re capable of far more than you can imagine in that suit. You’re fighting in my Crusade and I demand only one thing of my soldiers—fight until you die.” The channel clicked off.
Ely tried to move, but his suit was dead weight. One of the spears stabbed deeper into his breastplate and the tip hit the outer shell of his pod.
“Ghost? Ghost, do something!”
+I’m trying to do a hard reset without frying your brain. You think this is easy? Here, use this.+
Roland’s right arm pressed against the depression, lifting his body at an angle. The Rakka attacked with even more vigor.
The rotary cannon snapped out of the housing on his back. The Rakka with the spear through Ely’s breastplate got to look right down the barrels. A single shot blew its head off, then the weapon spun to life.
The Armor reactivated and Ely rolled onto his hands and knees, spilling Rakka into the depression where the worm had formed its barricade. He was on one knee and raised his torso up.
A crowd of Rakka around him suddenly became very sheepish. The rotary cannon unleashed a torrent of bolts. Each bolt ripped through several aliens as Ely swung around, keeping the cannon at chest level with the aliens and maximizing the damage of each shot.
The rotary cannon seized up, then ripped off the mount and clattered against the ground.
+It wasn’t fully installed. That’s on me. Careful. Where there’s Rakka, there’s always—+
Ely was struck from behind and he pitched forward, sliding through dead Rakka. Damage icons flared on his HUD and he felt a knob against his back within the pod. Whatever had hit him had dented the inner armor.
A blow shattered his right knee servo and Ely tried to cry out in pain. He rolled over and kicked out with his left leg. The centaur alien over him had mechanical lower limbs. Its humanoid upper half wore chain-mail armor and carried a long hammer made of black metal. The centaur lifted its front hooves up over Ely’s kick, then used the momentum of the dodge to bring the hammer down at Ely’s helm.
Ely caught the hammer by the hilt and held firm as the alien struggled to get it back. Ely kicked his heel into the alien’s underside and shot the anchor through its body. The centaur cried out and writhed like a speared fish before dying. Ely kicked it away and tried to get up, but the damaged leg wouldn’t hold his weight.
He crawled out of the depression and onto the garage floor, dead Rakka scattered everywhere.
The breach in the wall was the same size as the worm that lay dead behind him. Its edges melted, a thrum rose from the dark tunnel.
“Those tread things going to work?” he asked. Unable to feel his right leg, he reached down to touch it and confirm that it was still there. The suit’s lower leg was still attached by wires and a wrecked knee servo.
+Housing’s jammed. You’re not going anywhere fast.+
Ely readied his gauss cannon as light caught something shiny within.
He opened fire and the blue flame of a broken plasma engine flared out of the tunnel with spinning lumps of metal. A drone shaped like a flower made of thorns and razors flew through the fire and rose toward the ceiling.
Ely clenched his fist and gauss shells ripped it to pieces. He swung his aim at another drone as it squeezed itself shut. Razor petals struck Ely in the chest and one struck the mouth of his helm. A gauss shell clipped the drone and it fell to the ground. The flower opened, trying to right itself.
Ely shot it again and it broke apart.
He touched his helm and tugged the petal out. The edges squirmed and blue plasma sparked from tiny spikes. He crushed it and tossed it away, feeling heat grow in his breastplate. Two petals were digging through the Armor, one directly on Elias’s name and the iron heart symbol. He swiped down and knocked one out. The other kept digging and had almost slipped fully into the cut when Ely’s fingertip pinned the back edge in place. He jammed a thumb into the cut and pried the Armor open to grab the petal, then ripped it apart.
There was a rustle of shadow in the tunnel and Ely started blasting. A pale-blue wall of energy formed inside the tunnel, moving toward him at an almost leisurely pace. His gauss shells struck the shield and evaporated into brief puffs of light.
Ely’s gauss cannons ran empty and a spent magazine fell out and into the depression.
+Last magazine…which just jammed. Working on it.+
The energy shield inside the tunnel shrank down to a single point, held in the air by a chrome hand. A human made of reflective metal emerged, taller than even Roland’s newer Armor. The statuesque suit was carved with perfectly proportioned fine lines, like a statue of a Greek god come to life. A short apron over the waist provided some modesty. Only the face was plain, like a blank mannequin.
“Is that you, Hale?” Nakir’s voice boomed from his suit. “That you’d be out here—alone—is almost too good to be true. But then Malal does smile
on his faithful. The wormhole that brought you here lingered just long enough for me to follow. Even a damaged Crucible can still work…to a degree.”
Ely clenched his gun fist several times and got an error sound each time.
“You’re too late,” Ely said. “They got the probe out of me.”
“Don’t lie to a Commissar. We take such insults personally.” Nakir held up the hand holding the light and tendrils reached out and crept into Ely’s helm. “Hoffman died before he could be of any more use. Same with his partner on the Crucible. All that trouble to get you off Earth and then you practically fall into my lap.”
“At least they died for what they believed in.” Ely winced as something traced the collar inside his pod.
“They failed. You don’t understand what the Geist are capable of, what they want for us.” Nakir came closer. “If you did, you’d surrender and join us. Glory awaits…who’s in there with you? I feel another soul. How is this—”
Ely’s world scrambled then reformed into a hospital room. A man with sandy-blond hair lay there, hooked to a bank of machines by IV lines and tubes that ran into his nose. Both arms ended just below the elbows, the stumps capped. The blanket over his legs collapsed just below the knees. Medical plastic covered his lower face, the mouth and chin gone.
Ghost—Aignar—opened his eyes and stared at Ely, pain and despair deep in his soul.
“No!” Nakir flinched, the tendrils shrinking back into the point of light.
The gauss shells ran down the ammo line into the cannon and locked into the breech.
+Do it.+
Ely punched into Nakir’s stomach and opened fire. Shells beat the beautiful plate into a mess of craters and gashes, but none broke through. Nakir backpedaled as hits cracked the chrome face and blew off fingers.
Nakir fell back with a cry and Ely ran out of ammo. Dragging himself onto his side, Nakir looked at Ely, smoke rising from the red-hot barrels of his cannons.
“This changes nothing,” Nakir said and retreated into the tunnel.
Gauss shells snapped over Ely’s head and struck near the breach.
Black Crusader Armor stomped past Ely and pursued the Commissar. Ely bent forward, both hands against the ground. His mind was spinning from whatever Nakir had done to him.
“Ely? Ely, you there?”
Roland was before him, on one knee, so they could look optic to optic.
“This Armor stuff’s not too hard,” Ely said.
“Who was with you?” Morrigan asked. She had a long rifle with a thick barrel in her hands. “Are they injured?”
“Just me and…” Ely tapped his helm, “my friendly Ghost.”
Roland and Morrigan looked at each other.
“Maybe there is something to the name,” Morrigan said.
“Hey, Roland, I may have some good news.” Ely tapped his chest.
“Marshal. Shaw,” Morrigan growled.
“What is it?” Roland asked.
“Remember how we don’t have the fuel for the faster-than-light engine? I think I’ve got some. My dog tags aren’t right. Dad’s no dummy, but maybe I am. Doesn’t take much of that star stuff to kick the engines past light speed. Maybe we’ve got a way off this rock…or a way for Makarov the Younger to help us out,” Ely said.
“We never scanned his dog tags?” Roland asked Morrigan.
“We were focused on the probe in his head, not his tags,” the Irish Armor said.
“Ely Hale from Terra Nova came with more than just a sliver of hope,” Roland said. “We’ll get a better look at your tags as soon as we can, but until then, I need you to keep fighting,” Roland said. “For the Crusade. For the Lady. For us all.”
“About that…” Ely motioned to his ruined leg.
“Easy repair.” Roland stood up. “Let’s get you fixed up, and then I’ll assign you to a lance. I’ve got someone in mind for you.”
“Then let’s get me back in the fight,” Ely said.
The Ghost laughed, a deep chuckle that continued in fits and spurts, like he was laughing at his own joke over and over again.
“What’s so funny?” Ely asked.
+Welcome to the war, kiddo. You’re a fighter, but you’re not Armor. Not yet. If you think this was easy, you’ve got another thing coming.+
“You know…I think my dad would be proud of me right now,” Ely said. “If I’m ever going to see him again, I have to fight. And I’ll fight with the Crusade.”
Chapter 25
The chirp of a cell phone roused Marc Ibarra from sleep. He snorted as he pawed underneath a pillow for the phone. He blinked hard and tried to read the caller ID. He didn’t know anyone named “ANSWER ME” and declined the call.
It rang again and hitting the X button didn’t stop the ringing. He threw it into a pile of dirty laundry, but the ringing only grew louder. His roommate complained bitterly from another room.
Marc rolled out of bed and answered the phone to end the awful disco anthem it was using as a ring tone. He hated disco with an absolute passion and would never have used that as a ring tone, not even for his ex-girlfriend who ran off to Japan with his favorite keyboard.
“What?” Marc rubbed his hand across his eyes. He glimpsed silver then shook his hand, and his skin was normal again.
“Marc Ibarra. I need to see you.” The voice was mechanical.
Marc dropped the phone. He’d had this dream too many times to fight it.
He was in the desert south of Phoenix, with only the light from his car’s headlamps and the stars to guide him. He had the phone to his ear as he stumbled around scrub plants.
“You’re standing on me,” came from the ground beneath his feet.
Marc dropped the phone and started digging. He knew the dream. He’d find the Qa’Resh probe a few inches down and then his whole world would change. He’d gone through this in the fugue state while his Ambassador body reassembled itself. Whatever matrix held his consciousness together seemed to enjoy this memory; the Qa’Resh tech of his body appreciated the memory of the probe.
He moved two handfuls of sand away, and instead of a glowing needle, he uncovered a corpse’s face.
“Gah!” Ibarra fell back on his rear. The corpse sat up, displaying a still-smoldering gash across his chest.
“You killed me.” Dust fell away from his face as he spoke, and Marc recognized him. Sam Perkins, head of Ibarra’s accounting division from decades after this moment.
Marc ran into the darkness and bumped into someone. Karen Summers, the first of many attorneys he hired when he patented his graphenium batteries. The left side of her body had been crushed; dark blood and pink brain matter dripped from her skull.
“You killed me,” she said and reached for him.
More corpses appeared from the darkness, every one with a familiar face. Marc tried to run, but he was surrounded. He reached up to the crescent moon and cried for help.
The desert was gone, replaced by a kitchen, the morning sun shining through tall glass windows. An Olympic-sized swimming pool glistened outside, a water slide built of native Arizona stone on one side.
The arms of a cooking robot moved over a stove, preparing eggs Benedict Southwestern style with potatoes in place of the English muffin, just how he liked them. The kitchen was full of the smell of coffee.
“Here, Grandpa.”
There was a little girl at a glass dining table, her heels kicking in the air beneath her seat. She was coloring furiously on a sketch pad, a box of crayons next to her. A steaming cup of coffee waited for Ibarra across from her.
Ibarra sat down and took a sip, welcoming the bitter taste. The girl had dark hair cut just below her chin; her blue eyes were bright and intelligent.
“What are you drawing, Stacey?” Ibarra took another sip.
“Destiny,” she said.
“That’s quite a tall order for someone that’s only six years old,” Ibarra said. “Can I see?”
“Not yet.” Stacey drew the sketch pad closer
to herself. “Grandpa, can you tell me something?”
“Anything, my dear.”
Stacey brought the sketch pad up to her face and looked over the top at him.
“Where’s Malal?”
The heat drained out of Marc’s coffee.
“What? Where did you hear that name?”
The skies darkened.
“We were there.” Stacey’s eyes changed, losing their color. “Remember? We took Malal away after the Xaros were destroyed.” She slapped the sketch pad to the table and a line of blood trickled from a corner of her mouth. “Where? Where is he?”
The crude drawing was of Stacey lying on her back, a simple frown on her face, a bullet hole in her chest. Ibarra snapped to his feet and hurled the table aside. It shattered the glass walls and the kitchen fractured with it.
Marc was in the Crucible, his body silver, his hands those of an alien Dotari. Stacey, now a young woman, lay on the ground, a bullet wound to her chest, her face deathly pale. Marc rushed to her, struggling to speak as the beak of his face morphed slowly into the mouth that his mind knew.
He grabbed Stacey beneath the arms and dragged her to the stasis chamber that would transfer her mind to an Ambassador body before she died.
“Don’t! Don’t do this!” Stacey cried out. “Let me die. You let billions go but not me!”
Ibarra hauled her into the stasis chamber and activated it. Instead of locking her body into place, Stacey beat at the clear lid, smearing her blood everywhere.
Marc bumped against the plinth that held Stacey’s Ambassador body, constructed of the same nigh-indestructible material as his. She’d spend the next two decades trapped in it, unable to return to her flesh and blood, lest she die moments later from the wound.
He whirled around, but Stacey’s Ambassador form wasn’t there.
Shannon smiled at him with a glint in her eyes.
“Hello, Marc.” She stepped off the plinth and walked behind a counter to where two copies of her lay dead, each shot to death. Stacey was still screaming inside the stasis chamber.
“This isn’t right.” Ibarra looked up, then put his silver hands to the sides of his head. “This isn’t what happened.”
