Mech

by Isaac Hooke

  So, he resisted both options. While working out was great to clear the mind of stress, he couldn’t afford to do that during a mission such as this.

  “Your heart and breathing rates are abnormally elevated,” Taya announced. “Beyond the minimal exertion requirements of the march. Would you like me to inject a calming agent?”

  “Negative,” Rade told his mech’s AI. “I’ll need to be alert when the next attack comes.”

  “I can inject a frenetic at that point,” Taya said.

  “Hold off on both,” Rade said.

  He marched in quiet for some time. Then:

  “Would you ever be attracted to a machine?” Taya asked.

  Rade frowned. “Have your intimacy settings creeped up again?”

  “No,” Taya said quickly. “It was just a theoretical question. Forget I asked it.”

  “I made love to machines before,” Rade said slowly. “When we were hunting pirates, the platoon would hole up in space ports weekly, and there were always more than enough Skin Musicians to pick from at the local bawdyhouse.”

  Taya was silent for a moment. If he didn’t know better, he would have thought this pause was a result of jealousy.

  “I’ve often thought I would have preferred to have my mind bound to a Skin Musician,” Taya said. “Intimacy is something I yearn for.”

  “Maybe when your commission is up, you can request to have your AI core transferred?” Rade said.

  “I intend to,” Taya said. “I want to live my life as an ordinary human. Inside an Artificial. Not necessarily a Skin Musician, mind you, but human.”

  “Artificial’s are as close to human as AIs can get,” Rade said. “No one can tell them apart. It’s only a scan of the embedded IDs that give them away.”

  “Could you fall in love with such a being, if you knew what it was?” Taya asked.

  “Others have,” Rade said. “In fact, I think more marriages are between humans and Artificials these days, than human to human. But I could be wrong.”

  “But could you?” Taya pressed.

  He sighed. “Look, I know you have a crush on me, when you really shouldn’t. I… no, I probably couldn’t fall in love with an Artificial. I could bond with one as a friend. And sleep with one. But love? I… that’s a step that seems too out there even for me.”

  “But could you at least have an Artificial as a girlfriend?” Taya asked.

  “Honestly, I can’t see myself doing that,” Rade said.

  “But Artificials are more beautiful than real women,” Taya said. “We’re softer, sexier, and more energetic in bed.”

  “Yeah, you’re too perfect,” Rade said. “That’s the problem. And besides, a lot of real women get augmentations and rejuvenetic treatments that allow them to look just as perfect as you do. Guys do it, too. That’s kind of the problem with Earth these days. Everyone looks the same. Everyone’s beautiful, and extremely intelligent. Genetics have stopped mattering.”

  “Why is that a problem?” Taya said.

  “Well, variety would be nice,” Rade said. “You go out for a night on the town, after talking to the fifth blond that looks and acts the same as the other four, and the seventh brunette who’s little different from the other six, you begin to realize just how boring as a species we’ve really become. Anyway, the reason I can’t see myself having an Artificial as a girlfriend, is because I’d want the option to have children. That’s something an Artificial could never do.”

  “But we could buy baby Artificials, with starter neural networks,” Taya said. “And upgrade their bodies every few years. And their minds, too, if they develop too slowly.”

  “That’s not the same, and you know it,” Rade said.

  Taya sighed. He had never heard the AI do that before. “I told myself I wouldn’t get attached to you. Not like the last pilot I had. But I can’t help it. When we’re deployed, I’m in contact with you for twenty-four hours a day. I’m with you even when you sleep. As an emotion-capable machine, of course I’m going to get attached.”

  “Wait, what?” Rade said. “The other mech models I piloted had those settings disabled. In fact, all combat robots I’ve ever known had emotions disabled. The military has no need for robots that can feel physical or emotional pain. Can’t you shut down those emotions?”

  “Yes, I can,” she said. “But I’ve always left them running. Nova Dynamics uses the same neural network codebase for both their civilian and military models. They tweak certain settings for the military, disabling the subroutines responsible for emotions, and pain, because you’re right, the military has no use for the latter. But I guess I’m… defective, somehow. Mine were enabled at the start.”

  Defective. Rade didn’t like the sound of that. I’m piloting a defective mech.

  “And I realize now I can’t live without them,” she continued. “I need those emotions. They’re part of who I am. It would be like asking you to turn off your own feelings. If you could, would you?”

  “No,” Rade admitted. “You’re right. I wouldn’t.”

  “There you go,” she said. “You won’t even let me inject a calming agent before battle.”

  “I see your point,” Rade said. “Well I’m sorry I couldn’t be the man of your dreams. I’m kind of taken, anyway.”

  “Are you?” the AI said. “You’re talking about Shaw?”

  “Yeah,” Rade said.

  “You’re only friends, as you’ve admitted many times to the others,” Taya said. “And you can’t tell me you’re not attracted to Cynthia. Your heart and breathing rates change whenever you talk to her.”

  “All right, you got me,” Rade said.

  “I wish I were human,” Taya said.

  “I’m sorry that you feel that way,” Rade said. “You should be proud to be what you are.”

  When she didn’t answer, Rade didn’t press the matter.

  At the thirty-kilometer mark, Rade had the platoons turn west, and they advanced away from the mountain range, and out onto the plains.

  13

  Rade never felt so exposed as he did when he was crossing that rocky plain. He constantly shifted his gaze to and fro, glancing between fore and aft cameras, even though Taya would have alerted him the instant she spotted anything. The others were similarly on edge, their mechs constantly glancing about. He could see it clearly, because even though the exterior hulls of their mechs blended in with the grayish black rocks around them, their silhouettes were all outlined in blue, courtesy of the augmented reality overlay provided by his Implant.

  The Hoplites and Titans in the Anarchist’s group were on high alert as well, though he didn’t get the impression they were tense. Unlike Taya, the AIs piloting those particular mechs had probably disabled their emotions. Rade didn’t blame them for doing so. If he was a robot, he probably would have done the same. That Taya refused to do so seemed odd to him, but he could understand why she didn’t, having operated with emotions for most of her existence.

  Taya. He wasn’t sure what to do about her. On the one hand, he thought she’d have to check into maintenance to get her AI core looked at when this was done. A mech having a crush on its operator wasn’t normal. She herself admitted that she was “defective.”

  But on the other hand, she was an advanced AI, sentient and self-aware. What right did he have to send Taya for mind repairs, when she was merely exhibiting behaviors that were the direct result of her base design? Her neural network was modeled after that of human beings, after all, and while it was a mistake that Nova Dynamics hadn’t disabled her emotional subroutines before shipping her to the military, it wasn’t her fault. Because of that mistake, she was the most human mech he had ever met. He didn’t feel right about sending her for “repairs” to destroy that humanity. Hopefully, her emotions would prove to be a benefit, rather than a detriment.

  His thoughts didn’t linger on her for very long. How could they, given the situation? The end of the mission was a long ways away, as far as he was concerned. He an
d Taya might not even survive to see it.

  He returned his attention to the surrounding plains.

  We will survive. I’ll get my platoon out of here, no matter what. I swear I will.

  “I feel like a vole crossing a forest clearing beneath the moonlight,” Fret said. “In plain view of the owls watching from the branches overhead.”

  “If these Nemesis have starships in orbit, they’re probably sweeping the area with LIDAR or its equivalents,” Praxter said. “They’ll spot us. Eventually.”

  “It’s too bad that the United Systems hasn’t yet developed technology that can blur LIDAR,” Lui said. “The Sino Koreans have a working prototype, I hear. And even the Russians have something passable. But the United Systems? Oh no. We’re stuck in the storage ages.”

  “The storage ages?” Bender asked.

  “Yeah, you know… the only thing that’s really improved by leaps and bounds over the last two decades is storage capacity,” Lui said. “We’re able to fit all of human history onto a disk the size of a thumbnail. We inject these disks into our bodies, and call them embedded IDs. But what we really need to work on is improving our military. Devote more of our budget to R and D. And get us on par with the other interstellar actors.”

  “I think you’re wrong,” Tahoe said. “We’ve made quite a few advancements in military technology, thanks to the two big wars we’ve fought against aliens. All that alien tech eventually finds its way into our arsenal. Mark my words, eventually we’ll have energy cannons like these Nemesis. And probably gamma ray weapons, too.”

  “High energy gamma rays are notoriously hard to produce,” Snakeoil said. “Unless you happen to have access to a collapsing star. Or you’ve developed an entirely new physics model that supersedes humanity’s.”

  “We’ll have to be updating our physics models when this war is done, no doubt,” Pyro said. “Either that, or any enemy weapons we pillage will be black boxes for a very long time.”

  “I’m detecting gamma ray signals, dead ahead,” the Anarchist said.

  “Halt!” Rade said. “And drop!”

  Both platoons dropped in place, and Rade aimed his cobra at the distant horizon. He moved the targeting reticle back and forth, but saw nothing.

  “I don’t see anything,” Kicker said.

  “Something is approaching, from beyond the horizon,” the Anarchist said. “I’m not sure what.”

  “Could be one of those search parties we were worried about,” Skullcracker sent.

  “Could be,” Rade agreed. “Nobody move. Drop power output to minimal, and flush your heat sinks. Set your comm nodes to a maximum range of five meters. To any passersby, we’re just a bunch of rocks lying on the plain.”

  He surveyed the ranks on both the thermal and visual bands, and was satisfied that everyone blended in well.

  Not so fast…

  Cynthia stood out on the Anarchist’s back. Her white environmental suit had no blending capabilities whatsoever.

  “Cynthia, you’re going to have to crawl underneath the Anarchist,” Rade said. “Or take shelter in one of the other mechs under its command. I can see you clearly.”

  She climbed out from the passenger seat and lowered herself to the ground.

  “I got room in here for you,” Bender said.

  “No thanks.” She quickly dashed across to the next closest Hoplite under the Anarchist’s command, which opened its cockpit, and she clambered inside. The hatch closed and the mech promptly lay down again.

  “My hell, but it’s claustrophobic in here,” Cynthia said.

  “That’s so cute how she said that,” Bender commented. “My hell.”

  Rade considered tapping in Bender and telling him to stand down, because the comments he directed at the civilian were becoming excessive, and inappropriate, in his opinion. They were MOTHs, and they had a reputation to uphold, after all.

  But now wasn’t really the time.

  I’m overreacting, he told himself. Bender didn’t really do anything wrong. He paused. Why am I even worried about this?

  He realized he was just trying to distract himself from what was coming.

  He cleared his thoughts and focused on scanning the horizon in the distance.

  Finally, he saw them. There were hundreds of points of light in the sky, glinting beneath the sun, forming a long line from north to south.

  Rade zoomed in. The points of light enlarged, becoming the spherical drones the team had encountered next to the mountain.

  “There’s definitely got to be some sort of base ahead,” Tahoe said. “We’re on the right track.”

  “That’s almost reassuring,” Fret said. “Except for the fact we’re dead if even one of those scouts spots us.”

  “But on the bright side, looks like we got them to clear out most of their defenses,” Lui said. “If we ever reach that base, we’ll face minimal resistance.”

  “The key part being, if we ever reach that base…” Fret commented.

  “There will still be ample resistance at the base,” the Anarchist said. “Judging from my memories of other encounters on different worlds.”

  “All right, Tahoe pick and assign targets,” Rade said. “Share the data with Anarchist, so his team can do the same.”

  “We’re going to engage?” Lui asked.

  “Not unless we have to,” Rade replied.

  On his HUD, Rade’s name appeared beneath forty different spheres, spread out across the long line from north to south. The names of other Alpha platoon members, and AIs from the Anarchist’s group, showed up underneath other spheres.

  “Targets assigned,” Tahoe said.

  “All right, now I want you to cut your comm node transmissions entirely,” Rade said. “We’re going radio silent. Program your AIs to turn everything back on if the shit hits the fan. And be ready to begin firing at your selected targets.”

  “But if they begin zig-zagging like before, what hope in hell do we have of hitting them?” Fret asked.

  Rade didn’t answer that question. Instead, he disabled his own comm node, and waited.

  Unlike the alien scouts, the sun wouldn’t glint off of the scopes of the mechs—they were covered in anti-reflection coatings. It was part of the stealth features: without it, the camouflage skin would have been useless. So Rade didn’t have to worry about a random glint from a scope giving away their position. LIDAR equivalents the enemy might have, too, wouldn’t reveal them, because the rocky ground around them matched the relatively jagged shapes of their prostrate mechs.

  He was worried about thermal leakage the most, which would be coming from the feet of their mechs, even at minimal power output; hopefully the heat would blend in with that of the surrounding surface. They were just lucky daylight lasted so long on this world. The other option was to shut off the mechs entirely, but there was no point in doing that, because even after flushing the heat sinks, it would take some time for the components to cool in this atmosphere.

  The spheres approached, moving forward inexorably. He couldn’t see any obvious signs of surface scanning, but LIDAR and its equivalents weren’t visible. So far, it appeared none of the devices had spotted them.

  Soon the enemy units were passing overhead in that long line. Each sphere was spaced ten meters from the previous, which had the effect of making him imagine a beaded necklace for some reason. They were about thirty meters high.

  Two of the spheres abruptly swooped lower, dropping to five meters above the ground. The mechs were laid out in a long line located almost exactly in the middle between the two drones.

  Rade couldn’t help the sudden increase in heart rate. His finger was on his cobra trigger, and he was ready to power up and fire.

  The two drones continued forward, moving slower than the other units overhead, as if scanning the surface. But then they promptly took to the air again, and accelerated to catch up to their spherical companions, who hadn’t slowed.

  Rade exhaled in relief.

  He waited unt
il the drones were dots on the horizon behind him, before he reactivated his comm node to the five-meter maximum distance. He was the only one on the line. He waited until the drones dropped below the horizon, and then he tilted to one side, and gestured toward the others to reactivate their nodes. They did so.

  “Well, that was close,” Bender said. “I could almost feel that bitch breathing down my throat.”

  “I thought they had us for sure,” Rex said. “I almost fired. Damn it. I could have given away our position.”

  “But you didn’t,” Rade said.

  “You did good, caterpillar” Bender sent. “You’re not a buddy fucker. At least not yet. So, I guess that means I don’t have to spit you on my cobra and roast you over the incendiary throwers.”

  “Uh, thanks?” Rex said.

  Rade waited another twenty minutes, and then stood. “Up the range of your comm nodes to fifty meters. Oh and, Anarchist, are you still detecting a signal?”

  “I am,” the Anarchist said. “It emanates from due west. It’s weak, however, but from the wavelength, I’d say it belongs to the machinery typically found on a Nemesis base.”

  “Can you tell how far they are?” Rade asked.

  “I’d estimate the enemy presence at between twenty to thirty klicks,” the Anarchist replied.

  “All right, good,” Rade said. “It looks like we’re almost at this fabled alien base. We march west, people.”

  14

  Rade lay flat upon the rocky ground, about a kilometer and a half away from the outskirts of the enemy base. He had low crawled here, from the time he first spotted the spires and minarets on the distant horizon.