by Joshua James
The ground beneath Wan and Tonga’s feet shook as the AIC war cannon fired. Wan watched as a burning projectile went flying over his head. The explosive projectile flew over the trio of walls, landing just beyond the innermost one. The concussive force made all three walls quiver and sent men flying.
“We need to take out that war cannon,” Werner growled to one of his lieutenants. “That almost took out the central facility in one shot.”
“Mortars!” screamed the man next to him.
Quick as that, a half-dozen soldiers emerged from one of the smaller buildings linked to the central structure. They placed several small four-foot-long tubes on the ground. Four automatic drill screws dug into the ground, anchoring them. In a matter of thirty seconds or so, the weapons were set up and started firing.
The mortar rounds were designed to explode about fifteen or twenty feet above the ground. From this initial round, a flurry of about one hundred small explosives was sent out in every direction, demolishing everything and everyone unlucky enough to be in its blast radius.
“Get them firing!” screamed Werner at almost the same time that the first mortars were sent airborne.
He watched intently to make sure the mortar rounds hit their mark. Even with assistance and coordination with satellites, the first volley just missed the war cannon but did manage to take out one of the APCs, though the troops inside simply got out and continued on foot.
“Reload before they get a better bead on us,” ordered Werner through his HUD, but he knew the odds were slim that the next shot from the war cannon was off-target. They’d had their shot and missed.
Wan and Tonga finally reached the outermost wall of the base. The pirate captain insisted that Tonga go first. With only one arm it was going to be hard, if not impossible.
“A little help!” yelled Wan, barely heard over the sound of the mortars firing again and the opposing war cannon trying to home in on the walls.
Tonga grabbed the cable. He wrapped it around his good arm. LeFay stood on the edge of the walls and grabbed the other end of the anchored cable. Then she pulled up. The large Tongan, easily six foot five or six, ascended quickly with her powerful help.
Quickly, but not quickly enough.
The next war cannon projectile hit the outermost wall only a few feet away from Tonga. Wan was thrown sideways, flying through the air like a ragdoll. It took a second for him to get his bearings. When he did and looked back to where Tonga had been, the wall was gone.
Wan looked around for Tonga on the ground, but he was simply gone, blown to pieces by the concussive blast and the pieces of concrete that came with it.
Wan wiped concrete and dirt and ash from his face as she stood.
“At least I don’t have to climb up the wall,” he murmured as he clambered through the ragged hole.
He saw Clarissa and LeFay lying on the dirt beyond the wall. They hadn’t taken a direct hit, but they’d been thrown well clear by the blast. Both were moving, though neither looked like they were exactly all there.
Then he heard a voice to his right. He looked down and saw a UEF officer with a deep scowl and plenty of rank. Wan figured this must be a commanding officer of some kind.
“Auth code Alpha Niner Echo Wind,” the man screamed, relaying orders through his HUD, Wan realized. He wondered how the man could hear anything. Wan’s ears were still ringing. “This is Werner. I need air support, Vector 322. Repeat, I need immediate air support, Vector 322.”
Wan moved beyond the officer to stand over LeFay. He held his hand out. In that moment he did hate her. Because of her and the favor she’d asked of him, he’d lost everything. But in this moment, he was more concerned with surviving than with having it out with her.
LeFay took Wan’s hand, and he pulled her up. “Nice necklace,” he said as he saw the restrictor ring around her neck.
“Haha,” LeFay said.
“You got super ears that don’t ring, too?” Wan asked, half-joking. But LeFay nodded. Of course she did.
“Eardrums were replaced by superior synthetics years ago,” she said smugly.
“Looks like your friend isn’t as lucky,” Wan managed. He pointed at Clarissa.
LeFay helped her to her feet. “What’s the damage?” she asked.
“I can’t hear a damn thing,” Clarissa screamed at LeFay. “And I twisted my damn ankle,” she said, pointing at the knot that was already ballooning around her ankle. “But other than, never better.”
LeFay looked around. “Tonga?”
Wan shook his head sadly. LeFay just frowned. “Where’s Werner?”
Wan raised his eyebrows. “Hey, I know that one.” He pointed to the UEF officer on the ground near the base of the wall, screaming commands. “He’s ordering air support.”
“Little late for that,” LeFay said bitterly as they rushed over to join him. At least where he was situated, there was a little cover, though it was going to be useless soon.
“Target the damn cannon!” yelled Werner.
“I second that,” LeFay said behind him.
“I’m not getting a good signal through to the main Europa base.”
Wan scanned the sky. “They’re probably jamming. And all this airborne debris isn’t helping.”
The mortars kept firing, and they kept missing the war cannon. Instead they did little damage to the approaching forces, shielded by their APCs and spider tanks. Speaking of the tank, they’d gotten close enough that they’d stopped hovering over the ground. Their name came from the legs that sprouted out of the sides and dug into the Europa dirt. With them, they could very well climb over the walls or any obstacles they wished. Armed with cannons and plenty of guns, the three spider tanks were just as much of an immediate threat as the war cannon.
To make matters worse, two AIC bombers came screaming out from behind the ground forces. The triangular ships had very clear targets. They were aiming for the mortar squads and any anti-air ordnance the base housed.
“I know I wanted in here,” Wan said, “but I’m rethinking that decision now.”
Ada took in the carnage around her. Mortars fired as she saw and heard the anguish of dying soldiers, hit by the war cannon’s ridiculous projectiles. She watched as Congo and several UEF medics ran around, desperately trying to save lives or at least help some end peacefully, without pain. And the Swedish former Marine felt helpless. She hadn’t felt that way in so long it truly tore at her soul.
Upon hearing and seeing AIC bombers approaching, Ada had a good idea what their target was. She tried to get the mortar crews’ attention, but everything was too loud, too chaotic for them to hear her, so she did all she could. She grabbed Tomas by his arm and dragged him into cover with her.
Everything shook and felt like an earthquake as Ada and Tomas huddled down in the fetal position. AIC bombs fell on the mortar crews, nearly vaporizing them instantly. Several more hit the base proper, gauging out huge chunks of the thick reinforced-concrete roof of the central structure.
Ada knew what she had to do. Those bombers needed to be taken out, or else they’d circle around and come right back. They’d keep doing that until their payload was exhausted, which meant they’d return to base, re-arm, and start the process all over again. She wasn’t going to allow that. Neither was Tomas.
“We need to get to those AA guns,” said Ada as she pointed to two anti-air cannons that the bombers must not have seen. But they were situated on the middle wall, between the outer and inner. Only a rough system of wooden boards connected the two walls. They had to traverse those if they were going to fight back.
“Why not? Of course we do. I’ll go first.” Tomas kept popping his head up over the walls to make sure the coast was clear. It wasn’t. Chances were it was good as it was going to be, and those bombers would be back for another run before they knew it.
Tomas stood up and ran towards the rough system of wooden boards that joined the three walls outside the scout base. Ada followed close after. They were scared, sur
e, but more than anything, they rode their internal super speedways of adrenaline, tapping into the powerful natural chemical to pull them through and ignore the insane amount of danger involved in what they were attempting.
It was either that or sit around and do nothing, and Ada refused to accept fate that way. In her experience, there was little advantage in waiting for trouble. It would find you in the end, and she’d much rather be the one doing the attacking.
The spider tanks got close enough for their cannons to be effective. They aimed for the outer walls; huge shells zipped over LeFay, Clarissa and Werner’s heads. LeFay realized that if they didn’t move or fight back, those tanks were going to be the end of them. Either they’d aim at them and take them out deliberately, or they’d simply step on them. Something had to be done, and she was the only one crazy enough to do it.
“Take off this damn restrictor ring!” yelled LeFay as she looked straight at Werner, as pieces of the outer walls blew off and fell all around them.
“Can’t do that. I don’t trust you, Sarah!” yelled back Werner. He peeked over the concrete roadblock they hid behind, only to see that the spider tanks were maybe only a couple of minutes away.
“Remove the damn ring! Or do you want to die right here, right now? Because those tanks ain’t stopping!” It was rare that LeFay ever said anything that didn’t drip in sarcasm or snark. But here, facing sure death, she was deadly serious.
“We need her,” added Clarissa. “We can’t take those out by ourselves.”
Werner thought about it for a second. He heard another loud boom from the AIC war cannon. From the sound of it, its massive ball had hit the second middle wall. After weighing his options, he realized he had none. All he could do was set LeFay loose on them and hope the air strikes he called in arrived sooner rather than later.
“Fine! C’mere.” Werner beckoned LeFay close. He pressed his finger against a scanner on top of the button that both locked and released the restrictor ring. It beeped, then released, falling to the black dirt.
LeFay smiled, then pulled in Werner for a passionate kiss that took everyone, especially Werner, by surprise.
LeFay broke free without another word, leaving Werner speechless, and turned to Wan. “Sorry about everything.”
Wan was no dummy. He knew what was going on. The sad look in his eye told her that he knew he’d never see LeFay again, at least not alive. He nodded his head. “I still hate you.”
“Fair enough.”
LeFay turned to Clarissa. “Tell Ada, Ben, and Tomas that I’m sorry I couldn’t make it to the finish line. Stay safe, Claire.” LeFay then kissed Clarissa.
“What are you talking about?” Clarissa asked in confusion. “This is crazy—"
“Tell Blake I’ll see him soon. Him and the girls.”
With that, armed with a rifle, some grenades, and a pistol, LeFay burst out from behind the jagged concrete wall, rushing forward with the base at her back, with nothing to hide behind but the wind.
The first thing LeFay did was hold out one arm as she ran straight towards the three AIC spider tanks. Her lethal little drone, Pete, emerged.
“Go on, bud. It’s been real,” ordered LeFay as Pete shot up out of her forearm and flew erratically at first. Then it flew into the barrel of one of the tanks’ cannon. Seconds later the obedient little robot self-destructed, rendering the weapon unusable.
As she ran towards the AIC spider tanks, LeFay hacked into one of them. The driver inside panicked as all his systems went haywire as she slowly took them over. That left one tank without a cannon, but with plenty of guns and a fully intact tank as well.
The spider tank with the busted cannon trained all of its guns at LeFay. She pushed her legs to one hundred and fifty percent more than what was stable, hoping they wouldn’t just blow apart underneath her as she ran a circle around the lumbering armored behemoths. As bullets hit the dirt just feet behind her, LeFay scanned the machines for any weak points. She found one.
AIC spider tanks had thick armor, meant to withstand any handheld ground weapons, mortar strikes, and even low-level missile strikes. Their purpose was to bulldoze any obstacles so that foot soldiers could follow close behind. But their engineers had a problem. There was one part of their mechanical anatomy that couldn’t be heavily armored in fear of hampering maneuverability. That weak point? Where the machine’s legs connected to its torso: its joints.
LeFay fired at the cannon-less spider tank’s joints as she ran. Though not heavily armored, they could withstand high-speed super-heated rounds from a rifle. So she threw the useless gun away and took out her pistol-sized grenade launcher. Firing that while running was hard, but aided by the computers in her head and body she was able to—
Something ripped through LeFay’s shoulder. She didn’t feel it, but her HUD made damn sure she knew about the damage. Since it wasn’t her good arm, she ignored it and fired her grenade launcher twice, hitting the partially disabled spider tank right at the joints.
Almost immediately, the spider tank with the disabled cannon went down front-first in the dirt. Its driver tried to get the behemoth back to its feet, but without its front two legs, it was nearly impossible. LeFay felt the second bullet hitting her in her back.
LeFay was running so fast that when she went down she tumbled and rolled in the dirt, not stopping until she hit the husk of a long-downed fighter ship. She’d been shot twice. Her left arm was hanging off her body. But she wasn’t dead.
“I’m not dead!” she screamed into the sky.
As long as she wasn’t dead, she was going to keep fighting for no other reason than to damn the universe. The door to death might be hanging open, but she wasn’t ready to run through it just yet.
Ada tried her best to keep her balance on the thin wooden boards that connected the UEF scout base’s walls, but it was hard. Bullets were flying everywhere as AIC ground troops got closer, running in between the legs of their remaining operational spider tank towards the hole their artillery had blown in the outer wall.
It wasn’t just dodging bullets Ada had to worry about. The war cannon was still firing gigantic projectiles, threatening to topple the base’s now-meager defenses. Their bombers had returned and blown a hole in the only building’s roof so big that half of it collapsed on itself, killing an untold number of UEF troops.
Tomas looked back to make sure that Ada was still behind him. She was, though she was close to falling off the board. When he reached the other side, he held out his hand for her to grab. A trash can-sized piece of concrete and rebar that flew off the second wall after it got hit by a war cannon ball landed just behind her on the board, snapping it in two.
Ada fell to the ground below, just barely managing to twist her body enough not to break or sprain any limb. But she was just getting over grievous internal injuries that were no doubt agitated by the fall.
“Ada! You okay?” Tomas stood and looked down over the edge of the middle wall.
“I’m fine!” Ada yelled back. She clearly wasn’t, but she could move, and she could keep fighting, so in a way, she was. “Get to those AA guns before they come back!”
Tomas wanted to help Ada back up. But there was no ladder or anything that led back up for obvious reasons, and there was no time to think of an alternative. Those bombers were the biggest threat at the moment, and if he didn’t take them out, a lot more UEF soldiers were going to die.
“Go!” urged Ada as she got back up to her feet.
Tomas swallowed his guilt for leaving his friend behind and ran towards the nearest anti-air gun. Once he reached it, he couldn’t help but take a moment to look out on the battlefield. Slightly higher than the wall, the AA gun gave him a great but terrible view of hundreds of AIC soldiers rushing forward, and two operational spider tanks. It was clear to that they weren’t going to win this fight.
But then he thought about Ada trapped behind him, and all the rest of his friends, scattered about the base. He had to buy as much time for them as
he could.
It took less than ten seconds to power up and disengage the safeties on the anti-air guns. Then Tomas moved the gigantic guns, which were on an automated swivel, a full three hundred sixty degrees to make sure they were fully operational. The AIC bombers came back around and were heading straight towards him. He gritted his teeth and tightened his grip on the controls.
“Come and get some, you bastards,” he hissed under his breath.
Then he mashed down on the triggers and the gun exploded with power and pent-up energy.
Nine
Soft Invasion
“Where’s mommy?” cried Matthew as his father held him tight, sitting under a stairwell in the moon’s dark-side facilities.
“Mommy can’t come with us, buddy,” Sydal said as he checked the time in his HUD. According to an alert he’d gotten along with every lunar citizen, curfew was from 0700-2000. The clock in the same HUD said it was 6:56am.
“Why not?”
How are you gonna tell him that his mom is dead? And that his sister isn’t his sister, but a monster that killed their mom? How do you tell a boy that his world collapsed over the course of a single evening?
“They’re sleeping,” he said. “Mommy and Rebecca are sleeping right now.”
Wrong, wrong, wrong.
“Did…did Becca hurt mommy? Is that why they’re sleeping?” asked Matthew as he wiped the snot from his nose.
Sydal looked away from his son and bit his lower lip, trying to hold back his own tears.
Goddammit, Matty, I don’t know how to answer that.
But he did know how to answer. With everything going on, he had to be honest. “Yes. But she didn’t mean to hurt mommy,” Sydal said. “Rebecca loves mommy, and mommy loves her. Even now.” Sydal gently lifted Mathew’s face. “You know that, right?”
“I know,” Matthew nodded. “I love them too.”
