by S D Tanner
“How are we gonna do that?”
As the door to the engine room closed behind them, he grinned at Joker. “We’re gonna rustle it.”
CHAPTER SIX: Ship’s Ahoy!
When they walked onto the Bridge, Joker headed to the teleportation console to round up Hawk and Jack. Judge was hunched in the command chair, speaking earnestly into his headset.
“How many robot gunners are there?” Nodding as if the speaker on the communication channel could see him, Judge added, “That’s no problem. Send in the Dead Force.”
Rok and Ash were in command of the Dead Force, so he assumed that’s who Judge was talking to. Using the sensors inside his prosthesis, he tapped their icons on the screen inside his eye cover. Rok’s worried voice hammered through his earpiece.
“Each squad only has one gun, and there’s a thousand bots down there.”
Judge was trained to keep men calm in combat, and his reply almost sounded disinterested. “I hear that, but two hundred troops are a fair fight and we need the guns.”
“Some of those suckers are packing AP rounds.”
“That’s no problem. We’ll use the teleporter to casevac the wounded to the Extrema.”
Judge had warned him Rok and Ash weren’t up to the task of leading the Dead Force, and their lack of experience was showing. He’d ordered Judge to send a battalion of the Dead Force to the desert where people were fighting for their pod on the arks, but the aliens had replaced the Dead Force guarding them with robot gunners. On the surface, two hundred troops against a thousand robot gunners wasn’t a fair fight, but with a little more thought he decided it was close enough. The Dead Force could be repaired providing they were loaded into pods. Joker and the robot Jessica would work the teleporter hard to evac their wounded, and they had plenty of spare pods once they were onboard. Even if they ran short, then Robert could wake some sleepers to make room for the wounded troops.
Walking over to Joker’s console, he overheard him talking. “Ok, Hawk, Tag’ll be happy about that.” After falling silent for a moment, Joker added, “Ok, I’ll let him know.”
When he tapped Joker’s shoulder, he looked up at him. “Hawk, hold for Tag.” Still looking at him, Joker asked, “What do you need?”
“Rok’s heading into combat and he’ll be taking a lot of casualties. Have Robert check how many pods we have free. Make sure we have enough for the wounded.”
“How many are you expecting?”
There were only two hundred troops with Rok, so at least the number was capped. “Up to two hundred.”
“Roger that.”
“You and Jessica manage the emergency evacs. Teleport wounded to the main arterial corridor and have the Extrema Defensors load them into pods.”
“Roger that.”
“But first teleport me to Rok’s position.”
Joker glanced at him in surprise. “What about Judge?”
Taking lead on the mission was stealing Judge’s glory, but he needed to learn more about the Dead Force. Choosing the mission lead wasn’t Joker’s responsibility, and he shrugged at him. “Did Hawk give you an update?”
“Yeah, he reckons they can fly the beacons.”
“Can he land them?”
Snorting, Joker shook his head. “They’ve hijacked three of them now, but we’ve only got one left. Nuff said.”
There were thousands of beacons orbiting Earth, so the high rate of attrition wasn’t a problem. Joker and Jessica could always teleport the pilots to safety before the beacons crashed. His main problem was he didn’t have enough pilots, which was another reason he needed to catch up with Rok.
“How many can he can steal?”
Joker shrugged. “It depends on how hard you run me and Jess. We’re still getting the hang of teleportation, but between us we can probably control a dozen single person teleports at a time. Just don’t expect us to do much else while we’re dealing with them.”
Every battle relied on transportation, if only to evac the wounded and keep the troops supplied. Being given a limit of twelve concurrent teleports at one time was going to cramp his style, particularly if his pilots couldn’t land a beacon.
Harrumphing softly to himself, he spun around to look at Judge. “Judge! New mission brief.”
Turning the command chair to face him, Judge’s mouth twisted with irritation. “I’m not finished with your last order.”
“Don’t care. I’ll take over Rok. I want those arks under our control.”
“What do you want me to do?”
“Work with Hawk and steal us some air support. I’ll find you pilots when I see Rok.”
“How are you gonna do that?”
“Some of the Dead Force must have been fly boys and, if what Jack says about the controls is true, even a half decent gamer could handle one.”
“How many beacons do you want?”
Joker replied for him, “They can’t land the beacons, and there’s a limit to how many concurrent teleports me and Jess can handle.”
Rising to his feet, Judge smiled wryly at him. “So, you’re taking the fun mission and handing me another piece of crap.”
Winking at Judge, he then snapped down his faceplate. “Sucks to be you. Joker, teleport me to Rok.”
The Bridge disappeared and he was again inside the emptiness of teleportation, which was fast becoming his favorite place to be. While he zipped through time and space, no one could bother him and it was blissfully quiet. Just as he was beginning to relax inside the nothingness, a spray of sand whipped past his helmet. The sound of relentless gunfire reached through his earpiece, along with hundreds of screaming voices.
When the sand cleared, he was standing on top of a low hill looking down at the battlefield around the three arks. Given they’d destroyed one of the arks, he didn’t understand why there were three ships parked on the sand. Just how many arks did the aliens have and where were they? On his first visit people had been fighting for a pod on an ark, but now they were running away from them screaming in fear.
There were no Defensors surrounding the arks, but robot gunners were rounding up people and driving them toward the ships. Civilians he assumed had intended to fight for a pod were running from the gunners and he could see why. Anyone who didn’t willingly march onto an ark was shot, and their bodies were trampled into the sand by the gunners. Once again, the desert was drenched in human blood, only this time the aliens were using the robot gunners to pull the trigger. He was beginning to understand how the aliens operated. A person did what they wanted willingly or they were forced to cooperate, but either way the aliens always got what they wanted.
Rok seemed unsurprised to see him. “Where’s Judge?”
“Working with Hawk to get us air support.”
He turned away from the scene below to face the two hundred Dead Force troopers behind him. “Why are they up here and not down there?”
“I’ve got twenty-five squads and twenty-five guns.” Rok flicked his chin at the thousand robot gunners. “It’ll be a massacre.”
“It’s a massacre now.”
“Not of my guys.”
“Don’t care.” Looking around, he saw Ash standing with the squads and he waved at him. “Ash, grab a teleport back to the city and round up the Dead Force. Find me as many pilots as you can and tap Joker to teleport them to the Extrema.”
“What’s your max number?”
“Cap it at a hundred. I’m expecting a lot of attrition.”
“Why?”
“No one knows how to land a beacon.”
“Bummer.”
Turning to Rok, he slapped his shoulder. “Time to get busy. I want control of those arks.”
Rok shook his head. “Way to show leadership, Tag. You’re even crazier than Judge.”
Waving his hand toward the desert, he shouted, “Defensors, attack!”
He slid down the low hill, feeling the sand shifting under his boots. “Defensors, take weapons. Bo
ard and hold the arks.”
In less than a minute, he was running across the sand with two hundred boots following him. Judge was right, although every mission was planned to the tiniest detail, the fun only started when they engaged the enemy. Clustered together, the Dead Force were turning the sand into a trail of smoke behind them. People caught between the robot gunners and the Defensors pounding across the sand were stopping, unsure which direction to run in. Some turned and headed toward the gunners only to be shot down, others raced to the side clearly hoping to skirt around both armies. Only the bravest stormed at them with their guns firing.
Waving his arms at the people, he shouted, “Cease fire!”
“Seriously, Tag?” Rok asked.
“Not you.”
“Good, ‘cos I wasn’t gonna follow that order.”
When he reached the first person firing at them, he grabbed the barrel of the smoking gun. “Cease fire! Pass it on!”
The man yanked the barrel from his grasp, glaring up at him in disbelief. “You must be jokin’.”
Actions spoke louder than words, and he pushed the man into the cluster of Defensors running behind him. “Back of the line.”
A Defensor grabbed the man, heaving him into the others behind him. “Back of the line!”
He caught a woman by the waist, lifted her up and then dumped her between two Defensors. Her body stiffened and she began screaming in fear or rage, he wasn’t sure which. Ignoring her howling, the Defensor pushed her behind him, where another did the same until he couldn’t see her anymore.
The people in front of him stopped firing and began pushing past him into the clustered Defensors. “Back of the line!”
It didn’t take long for more people to learn the Defensors were not their enemy. The field in front of him grew thick with survivors running toward their position. While most of the robot gunners surrounded the arks, some were marching across the sand and shooting people in the back.
Still running toward the arks, he shouted, “Make a hole! Let the people through.”
People were running past him and through the gaps between the Defensors. Once a person was behind their line, the Defensors closed the gap to give them cover. All along the line, he could hear them calling to one another.
“Make a hole!”
“Back of the line!”
As more people hid behind the wall of Defensors, a battle line was being drawn between his troopers and the robot gunners. Just as Rok had warned him, there were a thousand gunners, and at least half of them were marching at their line. Rok had clustered the troops together, but if he widened the line then the gunners would have to spread out. They could win this battle if they took down one gunner at a time, stole their weapons, and used their guns against them.
“Spread the line!”
Two hundred Defensors raced across the sand, putting distance between one another until the line was five hundred yards wide. They were taking fire and some of his troopers were collapsing onto the sand. Every time a soldier fell they vanished almost immediately. Joker and Jessica were monitoring the battle via their cams and teleporting them to safety. His armor was deflecting the lower caliber bullets, but it wouldn’t be long before the gunners learned to use their armor-piercing ammunition. When the Defensor next to him dropped to his knees clutching his gut, he knew he was out of time and luck.
“Defensors, attack!”
A robot gunner was methodically firing, but now the line of troopers was spread it had to swing its weapon in a ninety-degree arc. The wider spread of bullets was mostly only clipping his troopers. Drawing closer to the gunner, he dropped into a skid, cleating it in one stumpy knee. The gunner lurched to the right and its bullets thudded into the sand. Another Defensor slammed into the robot, making it topple backward, while another leapt in the air and landed a hard kick. Once the robot was down, he scrambled to his feet, checking the fight taking place around the arks. Defensors were dragging the robots to the ground, or spinning them around so they shot at one another.
The people who had run between their lines and used them as cover had stopped to stare at the spectacle. Dead Force soldiers were hammering the robot shooters into the ground before wrenching the guns from their round metal bodies. The stolen weapons and ammunition were being passed between the troopers. As the Dead Force progressively became armed, the fight against the robot gunners intensified. Now able to use the gunner’s weapons against them, they were shooting out the scanners at the top of their fat bodies. Once blinded, the gunners spun in useless circles, unable to target anything.
Satisfied the battle outside the arks was under control, he waved at Rok. “Rok, send three squads into every ark. Take the Bridge and contact Joker for lift off.”
“Where are we going?”
He pointed to the sky. “Anywhere but here.”
Attacking five floating cities would take an arsenal he didn’t have, so he would use anything he managed to steal. Jessica and Joker would have to send the arks into space if that’s what it took to hold them secure. The arks didn’t appear to have any defenses, which suggested the aliens had no enemies within their star system, and maybe that’s why they’d taken over Earth. It was far enough away for the aliens to build the gear they needed for the war they were fighting elsewhere. Joker didn’t seem to know the full reach of teleportation and, for all he knew, the aliens were sending the weapons they built on Earth to another star system or galaxy.
Even if he managed to free Jessica, he doubted she could tell him what the aliens were really doing. They were clever, and it wouldn’t surprise him if they controlled intel by limiting what an individual knew. He was trying to defeat an enemy after the war had already been lost, but although they’d won the invasion, he knew it took different resources and skills to hold onto territory. Without the cooperation of the local population, an occupying army was always at risk of being overthrown. It took a lot of grunt power to hold a country under control, much less an entire planet or region of space. All he had to do was disrupt the occupation, which he could do by using insurgency tactics, but if he wanted to be more than a thorn in their side, he had to become a visible threat.
“Tag, are you coming or what?” Rok shouted.
The battle against the gunners was losing energy. Robots littered the sand, lying awkwardly so their stubby feet stuck up in the air. Every one of them had been torn open until wires and spikes of metal poked out of their buckled frames. The guns and ammunition belts had been torn from their fat bodies in a surgical operation that had killed the host. Less than a hundred of the Dead Force army stood around the bodies, horse trading weapons and parts. Some of the troops were forming untidy piles of extra guns and ammunition. He could hear Sergeants shouting at the squads, ordering them to get ready to move the gear. Less than a hundred of Rok’s battalion were already onboard the arks, and the others would take the extra weapons to the Dead Force waiting inside the city. Even winning this fight didn’t give them enough guns. He still had to find where they were being manufactured, but the haul was better than nothing.
“Joker, teleport the Dead Force outside the arks back to the city.”
“Roger that, but where do you want the arks.”
“Where’s safe?”
The next voice he heard was Jessica’s. “Dark side of the moon.”
CHAPTER SEVEN: First to Fight, Last to Die
“You’re a pain in my ass, Tag.”
The look in Judge’s eyes made it clear this time he wasn’t kidding. Dropping into the command chair on the Bridge, he leaned back until he was looking up at Judge. “What’s your beef?”
“What the hell did you get up to down there?” Before he could answer, Judge waved his hand dismissively. “I don’t need you to tell me. I can see well enough with my own eyes.” He flicked his chin at Joker and Jessica sitting at the consoles behind him. “They brought fifty wounded on board.”
“Are they in pods?”
&nb
sp; “Of course,” Judge replied irritably. Giving him a hard look, he added, “I know my job. Do you know yours?”
He snorted, spinning the chair around until it faced Joker and Jessica. “Yep, but my job’s tougher than yours.”
“How do you figure that?”
“You follow orders, but it’s my job to work out what those orders are.” Giving Judge a sidelong look, his mouth twisted with a cynical smirk. “Do you want my job? I’m not that attached to it.”
Judge crossed his arms over his chest, staring down at him as if contemplating his question, but then he shrugged. “What I want is to get inside more of the floating cities.”
“Weapons and ammo?”
“What do you think?”
“Joker, does the ark have any scanning ability?”
“Not that we’ve found.”
Shaking his head, Judge sat next to Jessica with his shoulders rounding in defeat. “Why would they have ships with no defenses or scanners?”
“I have no protocols to defend the arks from an outside attack,” Jessica replied.
“So?” Judge asked.
Joker leaned forward in his chair so he could see past Jessica to where Judge was sitting. “It implies the aliens never expect the arks to come under attack.”
“So?”
He shook his head at Judge. “It means they have no enemies, not only on Earth, but in this region of space.”
“Why should I be surprised by that?”
“Because it defies logic, dude,” Joker replied patiently. “If there are aliens on Earth, then it means there are other lifeforms in the Universe.”
Comprehension dawned across Judge’s craggy features. “So, where are they?” Leaning forward until he could see past Jessica, he added, “Either our enemy is so dominant they control this section of space, or Earth is so far away there’s nothing out here.”
“Exactly,” Joker replied with a wink.
“It’s a strength,” he added.
Glancing at him, Judge replied, “It isn’t if they can call for back up.” Judge looked across at Joker again. “What’s the reach on the teleport?”
