by Isaac Hooke
The platoon retreated from the edge at a run. I followed close behind Facehopper.
He glanced over his shoulder at me. “What part about not pissing off the alien did you miss, mate?”
The entire border of the rooftop behind us, railing and all, crumbled away. I ducked behind a nearby superstructure, and watched more sections break off as the alien systematically collapsed the roof with its weapon. I was forced to retreat to a structure farther back as those impacts kept coming in.
For a while there, I thought we were going to have to dive into the elevator shaft to escape.
The attack finally ceased after one quarter of the roof had been dissolved.
The platoon slowly crept back toward the edge.
A gaping hole three stories deep had been carved into the top of the building. I wondered how long the rest of the damaged rooftop would hold.
“Nicely done, Rage,” Facehopper said.
I gazed through my scope. The alien had returned behind cover, and was concentrating fire on Dragon platoon once again.
I didn’t know quite what to make of the little bastard. But I did know that I wouldn’t be firing at the thing again.
Movement drew my eyes to the shuttle pad on the warehouse. The doors of the freight elevator beside it were sliding open.
So much for the building not having power . . .
I stared at the opening doors, and as the metal shape within came into view, I had a sudden sinking feeling in my stomach.
It was an ATLAS 5.
The mech emerged from the elevator at a run, headed toward the rooftop edge closest to us. It took a running leap off and fired its jumpjets.
“ATLAS 5, incoming!” I switched my rifle to full automatic mode, releasing a stream of bullets at the mech as it roared in a parabolic path toward our rooftop.
The ATLAS 5 unfortunately decided to return the favor, and threads of Gatling fire erupted from it, chewing into our building.
One of my platoon brothers launched a rocket.
The ATLAS 5 responded by firing its Trench Coat. The metal shards detonated the rocket prematurely, and the mech continued toward our building unharmed.
My exposed brothers and I were forced to disperse beneath that incessant Gatling fire, taking cover behind the remaining superstructures.
I dove behind a rooftop exhaust port. Tahoe ended up beside me.
The enemy ATLAS landed, sending up a plume of cement dust. The roof shook precariously, and for a moment I thought the remainder of the terrace would collapse.
“If anyone has any rockets left, now’s the time to use them, people,” the Chief sent over the comm.
Grenades started going off around the ATLAS 5, but that served only to attract its attention. The mech stepped forward, unloading round after round at the source of the grenades—one of the massive rooftop aerials.
“Oh shit!” Lui retreated from the aerial as it tore apart, ducking behind the shack-like superstructure of the stairwell instead. The glass container wasn’t far from him. No one had taken cover behind the container, I noted—none of us wanted to endanger the mission.
The mech tramped malevolently toward Lui’s superstructure. Lui looked like a defenseless child beside that towering mass of servomotors and armaments bearing down on him.
“Uh, guys,” Lui transmitted. “Could use a little help here.”
The ATLAS was about four meters from Lui, and closing. Its back was to me.
“I’m going in,” I sent over the comm.
“Rade, wait—” Tahoe grabbed at me.
But I’d already left cover.
I vaulted toward the mech, combat knife in hand, and activated my jumpjets.
Like most MOTHs, I knew the ATLAS 5 like I knew my own body. And that included its weaknesses.
When I landed on its back, the mech swung around and bucked, trying to get me off. There was an electro-defense system that could be installed to prevent what I was about to do. It worked by electrifying the entire outer skin of the ATLAS, frying any jumpsuit interlopers. However, it wasn’t a popular add-on, because it took up the Trench Coat slots.
And because I’d seen the Trench Coat fire, I knew the electro-defense wasn’t installed.
As the mech bucked, I reached between the jumpjets and cut the fuel lines with my knife. Then I jabbed a gloved finger into the upper segment of the line, right into the main fuel tank itself.
“Laser pulse, 800t,” I said. My helmet picked up the request, and the surgical laser in my finger, ordinarily reserved for slicing open a jumpsuit for medical purposes, activated.
It pulsed for eight hundred trillionths of a second, right into the heart of the fuel tank.
I’d already started shoving away as the fuel ignited.
The jetpack and its fuel canisters were designed not to explode under ordinary conditions. Even if a bullet pierced, the containment integrity of the canisters would persist, and the fuel would simply vent.
In that moment, the ever-expanding, igniting fuel had nowhere else to go but the nozzles of the jetpack, which activated all at once.
Some of those nozzles were bigger than others, and provided the easiest egress for the exploding fuel. The biggest nozzle was for upward thrust, so the ATLAS 5 went flying into the air.
I fell backward hard, hitting the rooftop, knocking the wind out of myself. But I got lucky, because other than some minor melt damage to the outer sections of my glove, I was mostly unscathed. The surgical laser port on my glove was now offline. Melted away.
“Thanks, bro,” Lui sent. “I think you just used up one of your nine lives though.”
“Still got lots of lives left, don’t you worry, brother,” I returned.
A possessed Centurion abruptly burst from the stairwell and opened fire.
“Ambush!”
My platoon mates eliminated it.
Another Centurion emerged.
When that one toppled, Fret and Skullcracker moved forward, and unleashed hell into the stairwell.
On my HUD map, the red dots of enemy combatants appeared inside the stairwell and vanished just as quickly as they came. My two brothers were just mowing them down.
“Guys, watch it!” Bender said.
Widening pools of glowing liquid emerged from the fallen robots near the entrance, and flowed toward Skullcracker and Fret.
Skullcracker tossed four grenades into the stairwell, then slammed the door shut. He and Fret danced over the glowing pools to rejoin the platoon.
I felt the roof vibrate as the grenades exploded, and a black plume erupted from the outline of the stairwell door.
Ghost, Trace, and Skullcracker kept their aim on the stairwell, while the rest of the platoon turned their weapons toward the edges of the building. I was almost expecting another ATLAS 5 to leap onto the rooftop with its Gatlings ablaze.
“All right,” Chief Bourbonjack said. “I’d hoped to clear the warehouse rooftop, and take out that alien somehow, but it’s obvious we can’t hold this position much longer. Enemy robots in the stairwells. ATLAS 5s on our doorsteps. Liquid Phants closing in. We have to make a move. Stop pussyfooting around. Rage, do you have enough fuel to port the package across to the warehouse and back again? Assuming you and another platoon member took a direct path to the High-Value’s floor from here?”
On my map I input a test trajectory, and ran a simulation of two platoon members jetting across with the container. The fuel costs were steep, but within my current levels. Though whether I’d have sufficient fuel to return to the outskirts of the city for the extract afterward was questionable.
“I have more than enough to cross there and back, Chief,” I said.
“Good. Hijak, you’re going with Rage. The HS3 scouts have sent the updated location of the High-Value’s floor. Aim for that location. Jet across with all you have,
and get your asses inside there. The rest of the platoon will provide suppressive fire. We’ll be coming in right behind you, situation permitting.”
I confirmed Hijak’s fuel levels via my aReal, then I glanced at Tahoe, looking for his blessing. The Chief had given an order, and I wouldn’t disobey it, but I wanted to know that Tahoe was okay with this.
Tahoe knew what I wanted. He gave me a slow nod.
I hurried to the glass container. I felt bad about leaving Tahoe behind, but maybe it was better this way. What we were about to do was a last ditch, desperate effort. Jetting across like the Chief wanted would expose Hijak and me to intense—and I mean intense—gunfire from all sides. Sure, the platoon would provide suppressive fire, but I didn’t think the possessed Centurions really understood the point of suppression. They’d keep firing on us regardless.
By now, most of the platoon had low-crawled back to the damaged edge that overlooked the warehouse. Manic, Bomb, and Lui watched the three remaining edges of the building, respectively, while Skullcracker stayed where he was, heavy gun guarding the stairwell door and elevator shaft.
“Wait here,” I told Hijak, crouching forward.
I reached the damaged rooftop edge with its tendrils of twisted rebar, and peered over.
The warehouse across from us had very few windows. There were only three, spaced far apart, on the floor where the High-Value Target currently resided.
I aimed at the middle window.
Bullets started to ping the edge below me as Centurion snipers homed in on my, and the platoon’s, position.
I marked the destination window, programmed my planned trajectory into the jetpack interface, and dispatched the route to Hijak’s aReal.
“Accept the trajectory, Hijak,” I sent over the comm.
He did.
I rejoined Hijak at the container and attached the leftmost cord to my belt. Hijak had already secured himself to the rightmost.
“You think you can handle this, Hijak?” I said. “It’s going to get pretty intense out there.”
“The more intense the better, sir!”
I almost chuckled. Caterpillar bravado.
But he wasn’t a caterpillar anymore, I had to remind myself.
I stared for a moment at the gaping hole beyond the rooftop edge, and at my platoon brothers stationed there, firing down at the enemy and taking fire in return.
“You see that ahead of us, Hijak? That’s fate.”
Hijak seemed puzzled. “What are you saying, we’re doomed?”
“No, only that, every action we’ve ever done in our lives, every decision, every choice we’ve ever made has brought us here, to this mission, to this moment. Right here, right now, is what we’ve prepared for our entire lives.”
Hijak appeared surprisingly calm. “I’m ready for this moment, sir. I’ve been waiting for it since I was born. Let it come. For good or for bad.”
I nodded slowly.
We knelt, wrapping our gloves around the handholds of our respective sides. Together we lifted the container, feeling the weight of destiny in our hands.
We approached our brothers, halting three paces from the edge, just out of the line of fire from below.
“Sync to my jetpack, Hijak,” I said.
Hijak nodded. “Synced.”
I drew my pistol and tightened my grip on the container’s handhold with my other glove. “Ready, Chief.”
“Suppressive fire, boys!” the Chief announced.
The platoon opened fire all at once.
I glanced at Hijak: “On three.
“One . . .
“Two . . .
“Three!”
I took a run at the gaping edge, and vaulted into empty space, trying to get as much momentum as I could from my strength-enhanced jumpsuit. Hijak did the same beside me. The container seemed heavier than ever.
I switched to autopilot and my jetpack took over. It fired bursts at full power, following the preprogrammed trajectory I’d input. The container twisted and jerked beside me, threatening to wrench free of my grip. Somehow I held on to the damn thing. In that moment I promised myself that if I ever got out of this alive, I’d invent some kind of attachable jetpacks for containers like this. I’d become a billionaire.
As we traversed the chasm between the two buildings, Hijak’s jetpack thrust in sync with my own, automatically accounting for any discrepancies in the flight path to ensure he followed the exact same trajectory.
To compensate for the height difference between ourselves and the destination, we fell ten stories in four seconds.
Those were the longest four seconds of my life.
Not just because of the drop, which was terrifying in and of itself.
But the gunfire.
In training, the instructors hammered into our heads that jetting in full sight of the enemy left you completely exposed.
They were right.
It was a good thing our possessed robot friends weren’t especially good shots. Even so, if any among the enemy had launched a serpent missile while we were in transit, they would have taken us down. The missile targeting systems alone would have guaranteed it, considering how exposed we were.
But the enemy didn’t launch any missiles.
The destination window neared fast. Because it wasn’t all that wide, we’d have to traverse it in single file: me, followed by the container, then Hijak. I’d programmed that configuration into our trajectories already, so as we closed, Hijak veered off to the side, positioning himself and the container to my rear. My arm swung around as the handhold pivoted behind me.
Now came the moment of truth.
If the glass was bulletproof, then Hijak and I were screwed.
With my 9-mil, I shot at the window several times before impact.
The glass broke away in big pieces.
What a relief.
The jetpack cut out as I passed inside.
I collided heavily with the smooth floor and slid forward, my momentum draining away.
Behind me I heard the woosh of a rocket as it passed near the window outside. One of the ATLAS 5s on the street had launched a serpent after all. Too late. The rocket wouldn’t be able to track us now.
My mental gloating was interrupted as the glass container abruptly plowed into me from behind. Quite forcefully.
I’d forgotten that heavy objects have greater momentum than lighter ones. I should have dodged the impact.
I slipped sideways as the container shoved me onward, and I ended up gliding alongside it. The cord that bound me to the container grew taut, and I was dragged for a few seconds until the object slid to a halt.
According to the HUD map, the High-Value Target lay directly ahead, along the far wall.
I unlocked the cord from my belt and rose to one knee. I held my 9-mil to eye level and scanned the room.
The entire area was basically one big room, similar to the floor plan of the office building, but instead of cubicles and desks partitioning the area, the space was divided into a lattice of brick pillars arranged in rows and columns. Crates and empty pallets were stacked between some of the pillars, blocking the view to the far wall (and the target). Overhead, bright, working LEDs lit the area. No emergency lamps here.
I didn’t see any immediate threats.
“Chief,” I sent into the comm. “We’re in.”
Static answered me.
I heard the clang of metallic footsteps.
I hurried behind a pillar, and Hijak ducked against the one beside me.
I holstered my pistol, silently sliding the rifle down from my shoulder.
I gazed through the scope, scanning from left to right. Still didn’t see any threats . . .
Wait.
There.
A Praetor, near the center of the room. Advancing toward
me and Hijak. I hadn’t seen it before because the long row of pillars had obscured my view.
I aimed for the brain case in the chest and fired.
I got it. The Praetor vanished from sight, tumbling behind one of the pillars.
Normally when you found a Praetor, a squad of Centurions was close behind. But these Phants could possess Praetors and Centurions alike, and once possessed, there was no guarantee the Centurions would continue to obey the commands of the Praetor.
The robot may have been acting alone, but I wasn’t going to take the chance.
I gave Hijak the “advance” hand signal, and I moved forward at a crouch, rifle at the ready. I ducked behind every third pillar, scanning the room each time. Nothing.
When I neared the fallen Praetor, I gave it a wide berth. The glowing blue liquid of the Phant had spilled out, and it edged toward me (a little indignantly, I thought) as I hurried past. It moved far too slowly to reach me, however.
Nine pillars later, I spotted the High-Value.
The Artificial stood in the exact spot indicated by the HUD map. It just waited there, facing me, motionless on the far side of the room. Through my scope, I confirmed it was the spitting image of the Paramount Leader. Its eyes were closed, and it was smiling as if privy to some inside joke.
“Chief,” I sent into the comm. “High-Value Target spotted.”
As usual, static.
The Artificial, or the Praetor, before I terminated it, must have called in support units, because the clank of metallic footsteps echoed across the room, heralding the arrival of more robots.
Remaining behind the pillar, I scanned the forward area, identifying the stairwells at the far corners of the room where the Centurions were piling inside.
I glanced at the HUD map for any sign of my platoon mates. Seeing nothing, I double-checked over my shoulder.
No one had come.
“Chief?” I sent into the comm. “What happened to coming in right behind us?”
No answer.
“He did say, situation permitting,” Hijak piped up.
I could only shake my head.
I returned my attention to my rifle sights. The Centurions had fanned out across the floor, but hadn’t spotted me or Hijak yet.
