Nanotroopers Episode 2: Nog School

by Philip Bosshardt

Mite Barnes offered. “Fry the ground before we move on.”

  Winger wanted to do just that but the rules of engagement were clear. “We’re supposed to be looking for a small group of hostages. And minimizing collateral damage to infrastructure. We’ll move in, but keep your HERFs and mag weapons spooled up.” Winger had long ago decided you’d better follow Ironpants’ orders to the letter, if you wanted to live a long, healthy life in the Corps.

  Spider Squad eased their way forward, step by step, with Ng and Winger keeping a close eye on everything Superfly was telling them.

  The Solnet reporter brought up the rear.

  The first time Solnet reporter Mei Li saw the town was through the ornithopter vidstream coming in over her wristpad…it looked like something from a mid-20th century monster flick on the tiny screen, like Transylvania and dense fog and Dracula country. She knew it was all fake but at least somebody had a sense of imagination. She shivered in spite of herself and walked faster along the narrow rutted road to catch up with squad commander Cadet Sergeant Johnny Winger.

  “Dronecam, maintain overhead perspective, wide-angle, and follow me.” Mei Li hustled after Winger, turning to make sure the pigeon-sized ornithopter obeyed. The drone healed about and settled into a steady forward drift, its microwings churning and chittering three meters above her. On her wristpad, Li watched the vid feed coming from its cameras. Should be a good intro, nice and dramatic, she told herself. Edit can add sound effects later.

  “Recording now…this is Mei Li of Solnet Omnivision, on the outskirts of the town of Valleyville. I’m embedded with Spider Squad, 1st Nanospace Platoon of the Quantum Corps, on a live-fire tactical exercise in the hills of northern Idaho. We’re investigating the small town of Valleyville, basically a training set for these kinds of exercises. As a part of this exercise, there are ‘Intelligence’ reports from Q2 of swarm activity in the area. Spider Squad has orders to investigate. Sergeant…if you don’t mind…a moment, please….”

  Winger scowled and slowed down while the dronecam wheeled about and hovered a few meters over their heads. He flinched, swatted at the device like a fly. “Keep it short—“ He had to put up with this airhead reporter mainly because Battalion, in the form of Major Jurgen Kraft, said he had to.

  “Sergeant,” Mei Li walked alongside. “Why is Spider Squad checking out this village? What are you hoping to accomplish here?”

  Winger took a deep breath, explaining the scenario in exaggerated slowness, the way you would with a five-year old. “We thought the place was abandoned but Corporal Ivanchik---Moustache over there—and a few others said they saw lights, some kind of activity, in the town. We called it in, checked with Battalion. The brass said check it out. So…we’re checking it out.”

  “And your objective here, Sergeant, is--?”

  “To seize the town, secure the town and its perimeter, rescue any hostages, clear any swarms we find and hold this territory until relieved by Normals moving down from the northwest.”

  Winger abruptly raised a hand, calling a halt to the march. He motioned several troopers over. “Nguyen, you and D’Nunzio and Barnes, form a detail! Recon this street, down to the clocktower. Keep your eyes open, guys…Q2 says this is Normal territory but we’ve had bug reports too.”

  “Right, Sarge—“ said Nguyen. As they trotted off, a pair of Superfly drones wheeled about overhead, blowing past the dronecam, and headed into town for a top-eye view of what the detail faced.

  D‘Nunzio had the viewer on her wristpad, along with a small joystick. She sent commands to the birds, forming them up into a diamond recon pattern.

  Valleyville, as constructed for Operation Slammer, was little more than a village: a few stucco buildings, some with thatched roofs, a few barns on the outskirts, and a clocktower looming over the tiny piazza in the center of town. The street they were entering was a dirt path, a few sheds and ramshackle wooden buildings spotted along its edges.

  Mei Li spotted Corporal Ivanchik nearby, one of the HERF gunners. She decided Edit would love to have some footage from the regular troops. She went over and motioned for the dronecam to follow. It chirped and hummed, taking up a position nearby, wide-angle shots first.

  “Corporal, if I may—“

  Ivanchik was munching on a foodbar. He smiled faintly at the reporter’s approach. “Want a bar…I got lots of ‘em…tastes like sawdust, this one—“

  “No thanks, Corporal…for our viewers, this is Corporal Edward Invanchik…your comrades call you Moustache?”

  Ivanchik fondled his thick black lip forest. “You like it?…I work on it everyday. Sarge says it ain’t regulation, but he never does anything about it.”

  “Corporal, you are a HERF gunner…tell us about that—“

  Ivanchik hoisted his weapon up, stroking the generator casing below the barrel. “Sweetness? Yeah, me and Sweetness…we’ve wasted a few bugs over the last few months. I do my job real well…High Energy Radio Frequency…this one’s a Mark 4…I done a few mods myself. You want your bugs fried or extra crispy…me and Sweetness can do it anyway you like it—“

  Mei Li was about to ask another question, but the wristpad on Ivanchik’s arm chirped and beeped…incoming data. It was a video feed from the recon detail…Moustache held up his other hand while he studied the results.

  Winger came over too. They pondered the results…vid from the drones, EM signatures, thermal emissions. The imagery showed townsfolk going about their business.

  “Looks like a bunch of Normals to me,” Moustache was saying. “Don’t see any spikes or transients like bots put out—“

  “I’m not so sure—“ Sergeant Winger rubbed at some itchy stubble on his chin. “Damn Bugs are getting more and more clever. Hell, they look like you and me now…”

  “Sarge, even Bugs are nanobotic assemblers…to look like you and me, or anything else but a loose swarm, they gotta break atoms…and that gives off heat. You see any heat spikes--?”

  “I don’t like it,” said Lubitsky, another trooper who had joined them. “Bastards can look like cow patties and half the time, we’d never know.”

  Winger squinted at his own wristpad, pondering Battalion’s rules of engagement. “I’m doing this by the book. Plus, we got orders. Saddle up, boys and girls…we’re going into Valleyville.”

  It was just after dusk. The main street and the town square, the little oblong piazza with the clocktower, were dark and mostly deserted. A furtive glance came from windows along the road, apartments and houses, where curtains were drawn tight. Lights flickered and shadows shifted in the alleys between the buildings. From somewhere in the distance, cats screeched. Then it started to rain, a steady drizzle drumming on the tin roofs all around them.

  Barnes and Ng took point. One with a coilgun carbine at the ready, the other armed with HERF, the two troopers crept silently down the street, keeping away from lights that could silhouette them in the dark. Overhead, ornithopter drones and Superfly bots did top cover, spying out anything that moved, anything that gave off heat or light.

  Mei Li followed with her own drone. Winger snapped, “Keep that damn thing down low—below tree level—I want my guys to get a clean sniff of what’s out there.” The Solnet reporter

  complied, ordering the autocam ornithopter to half-hover a few meters behind her, sending a vid stream of Spider Squad’s approach into the town.

  Only a few townsfolk were out on the streets. Spider Squad stayed mostly to one side. The civilians paid them no attention. The troopers knew that the civvies were bots, most of them. The rest were locals, volunteers, paid by the Corps to participate in the training exercises. They took their jobs very seriously.

  An eerie, unnerving calm pervaded the center of the town. The steady drizzle muffled their steps.

  Mei Li decided to narrate their approach. She could edit for continuity later.

  “We’re entering Valleyville now…all the troopers o
f Spider Squad are on knife edge. For the moment—“ She stopped when shouts erupted from up ahead.

  “Bugs!”

  “Bots at three o’clock…down that alley--!!”

  Everyone took off running, leaving Mei Li behind. She broke into a trot and the drone whirred after her.

  Down a dark alley, someone thought they had seen swarms. Later, during the after-action debrief, Trooper Barnes, with Ivanchik and Lubitsky, insisted on it. “It was a cloud of bots, sure as I’m sitting here, moving across the alley.”

  “You’re sure it wasn’t just smoke…” Winger probed. “I smelled cooking fires, like chicken or something…maybe that’s what you saw—“

  But at the time it happened, nobody checked to see if the apparition was swarm or Normal.

  HERF rounds erupted and staccato coilgun fire stitched across the sides of the buildings. In seconds, the alley was a ball of flame and falling debris, a great smoking heap of rubble. Again and again, troopers poured fire into the alley. They had become immune to the difference between Normals and ANAD bots. Trigger-happy too, and Mei Li noted that in her voiceover. If it even remotely looked like a swarm, it was attacked with unrelenting ferocity.

  You just couldn’t be too careful. Even if it was an exercise. Especially if it was an exercise.

  After the dust had settled, nobody went down the alley to investigate. Winger ordered Spider Squad on into