by M. D. Cooper
“You think? Any idea where?” Ferris asked.
“Up there,” Rika highlighted a location on the ship’s nav systems. “There’s an old industrial region…if the SAMs hit, they won’t take out any civilians.”
“Stars,” Kelly muttered. “You mean the civilians who are shooting at us? Aren’t we all on the same side?”
“We have no idea who’s shooting at us,” Rika retorted. “But I’m half the core-damned reason these people lost their nation; I’m not going to park downtown and let missiles rain down on them.”
No one responded to that, and Ferris managed to get the ship over land, just as the vessel’s beams came back online. They lanced out, splashing coherent energy on the noses of the incoming SAMs, destroying all but one.
Ferris let out a string of curses—not what you want to hear from your pilot—and dropped to just a few meters above the buildings as the last missile closed.
“Hold on!” Ferris screamed, and then everything began to spin.
A rending sound tore through the cabin, and Rika saw stars out the back of the dropship. Then the ship slewed to the side hard enough to rip Rika from her harness. She slammed into a crate, then the bulkhead.
Up and down ceased to matter as she bounced around like a rag doll in a cyclone.
DROPSHIP DOWN
STELLAR DATE: 04.22.8949 (Adjusted Gregorian)
LOCATION: Abandoned Industrial Complex, North of Hittis
REGION: Iapetus, Hercules System, Septhian Alliance
The voice sounded small and distant. Rika wished it would pipe down and let her sleep, but the voice kept calling her over and over.
Rika decided the only way to get the voice to shut up was to listen to it. She pulled herself back to full consciousness—or something close—and cracked an eye, letting the world outside crash into her retina.
It was dark, but there was a smear of light to her right. Rika opened her other eye and saw flames and something moving in front of the fire.
“Fire?” she whispered. “Who lit a fire on a starship?”
Memory flooded into Rika, and her surroundings came into focus.
She was lying on a pile of rubble in a courtyard between two low buildings—each rising four or five stories on either side. Maybe six. They kept wavering in her vision.
The dropship was crashed in the center of the space, flames licking up one side of the craft. The shape she’d seen was an RR-3 mech with something over his shoulder. Rika struggled to her feet and saw that the something was human in form—Ferris.
Her HUD tagged the mech as Crunch, and Rika looked around for Shoshin and Kelly—seeing neither.
“Damn…. Is that all?” Rika asked.
“Go me,” Rika muttered, and released a pair of drones to provide an overview of the area as she approached Crunch.
“Captain Rika!” Crunch called out when he caught sight of her. “Was starting to think you’d all grown wings and flown off. Where are Shoshin and Kelly?”
“So he’s dead—” Crunch began.
“Or we just can’t pick him up down here.” Rika gave the corporal a reassuring look. “We’ll find him. Then we’ll get out of here.”
“And pummel whoever did this to my poor girl,” Ferris moaned from his place over Crunch’s shoulder.
“Huh, looks like you were too stupid to die,” Crunch grunted.
Ferris laughed, then moaned briefly. “But not stupid enough to stay slung over a bullet magnet like you, Crunch. Set me down.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah…was just out of sorts before. I’m good. Cockpit deployed its impact foam. I’m just shaken, not stirred.”
“Me either,” Ferris added. “I forgot my mech armor at home.”
“Whoever did this will have spotted the crash site,” Crunch said as he unslung his rifle—a KE-72 multifunction weapon.
“How many mags you have?” Rika asked.
“Ten. What about you?”
“Ten as well—for my JE-84. Five DPU rounds for my GNR.”
Rika pulled the GNR-41C’s barrel off her back and inspected it for damage before slotting it into the weapon that was her right arm.
“I should get one of those,” Crunch said. “Must be nice to always have a ridiculously deadly weapon on you.”
Rika patted the GNR. “Extreme force. Don’t leave home without it.”
Niki cautioned.
The three moved cautiously toward the building. Rika and Crunch switched to an IR/UV overlay, watching for shadows against background radiation as they entered the structure.
The building was old, likely abandoned for decades, and stripped clean of everything other than the largest machines—the purpose of which, Rika was uncertain.
Rika nodded as she peered around one of the large boxy machines.
Rika found a staircase and eyed it suspiciously. It looked like a passing breeze could make it crumble.
“We should go one at a time,” she said to Crunch and Ferris.
“Ladies first,” Ferris gestured magnanimously.
Rika sighed. “Ferris, at some point, you need to remember that you’re in a military outfit, here. I’m the company captain.”
Ferris’s face reddened enough that Rika bet she could have seen it, even without her mods.
“Sorry…just that I can’t see well in the dark, and you weigh less than Crunch, here.”
“She gets that, Ferris,” Crunch said. “It’s the ‘Captain’ that you keep missing.”
“Oh. Right, that.”
Rika shook her head and began to carefully climb the stairs, sticking to the edges. Once she reached the next floor, she called down for Ferris to follow, then Crunch.
They continued in that fashion until they reached the fourth level. Rika looked up and saw large sections of the roof above missing, starlight shining through.
she said to Niki as Ferris slowly crept up the stairs below.
Rika crept across the floor, releasing another drone to fly ahead, adding its feed to the display from the other two now circling high above.
The drone reached the rubble, and found Kelly lying unconscious under a beam and a piece of the roof.
Rika couldn’t Link to Kelly’s armor, but she could see the slight rise and fall of the SMI’s chest.
Once at Kelly’s side, Rika examined the debris and carefully lifted it off until her teammate was uncovered.
“No significant damage,” Ferris said as he approached Rika’s side.
“I guess the roof broke her fall.”
Rika reached down and slid open a small panel on Kelly’s side, beneath which was a hard-Link connection. She pulled a short cable from her wrist and connected to it.
C’mon, Kelly. I just got you back from the dead, I’m not going to let you check out on me now!
Kelly’s armor reported a recent completion of full diagnostics—which is what had set her Link offline. However, her mods had been unable to bring Kelly back to consciousness because of an error in the mental stimulation systems.
“What’s wrong with her, Captain?” Crunch asked as he approached.
“Not sure,” Rika replied. “Her armor and internal systems are unable to wake her.”
“Don’t you mechs have combat stims or something?” Ferris asked peering around anxiously as the sound of approaching craft grew louder.
“Crunch, look around for Shoshin. He and Kelly were standing beside each other in the dropship. He might be close.”
She knew it was unlikely that they landed nearby, but they had to start looking somewhere.
“Aye, Captain,” Crunch nodded before moving to another hole in the roof.
“Dammit, Kelly.”
Rika had heard that some of the mechs had been uncomfortable with their mods having any sort of access to their minds. It was understandable, after having compliance chips deliver discipline into their heads for so many years. But it also meant that their combat systems couldn’t bring them back to consciousness or provide awareness stims.
Of course, it also meant that a kick in the ass may be all that was needed to wake Kelly.
Rika disconnected from Kelly’s hard-Link and drew a leg back to do just that, when Kelly stirred.
“Really? You get me blown out of the sky, and a mech-foot to the head is what you top it off with?”
“Yeah, well, don’t scare me like that.” Rika set her foot back down and held out her hand. Kelly clasped it and pulled herself up.
“For saving me from her pointy foot?” Kelly asked.
“What?!” Kelly spun and glared at Rika’s forehead.
Rika pointed at her abdomen. “She’s down here.”
Kelly’s gaze slid to Rika’s stomach. “You had no right—”
“It’s not about rights,” Rika interrupted. “Combat mods—especially ones that bring you back to consciousness when you’re down—are not compliance chips. Stars, even regular soldiers like Ferris have them.”
Kelly’s head tilted, and Rika could imagine the glare she wore inside her helmet. “Doesn’t matter. It’s my head.”
Rika took a step toward Kelly and lowered her voice. “We just got shot down over what we thought was friendly soil. We’re missing Shoshin, and you were out cold. Niki did what was necessary for you to be combat effective. If you don’t want to be ready to fight when you’re needed, then you don’t want to be in my outfit.
“Just say the word, and when we get back to the ship, I’ll sign your discharge papers. I’ll even waive the fee for your surgery.”
“Rika, I…” Kelly began, then stopped when Rika held up her hand.
Kelly’s stance shifted, but it didn’t give away any of what was going on behind her faceshield.
Rika continued.
Rika switched her attention to the feeds from the drones and saw three aircraft inbound. They appeared to be civilian transport shuttles, though they didn’t bear any identifiable markings. One stayed high, while the other two set down at either end of the courtyard, bracketing the crashed dropship.
“Damn, I really thought our dropship would have gone up by now. I guess it’s better made than I thought,” Rika said as the drones showed armored troops disgorging from the two shuttles.
“I can’t believe you’d say that ‘bout my fair lady,” Ferris said, his voice thick with remorse.
“Looks like a mix of light and mid-grade armor,” Kelly commented, her voice completely professional—and emotionless.
Rika didn’t know if that was good news, or bad. It had only been four months since the Theban Alliance voted to join Septhia. The transfer of power was still underway, and would be for years. For the most part, the Theban military still operated as it had, though it was now bolstered by Septhian elements—especially here on the border.
Which made for a morass of military elements that had different ranks, uniforms, and equipment.
Many Thebans blamed the Marauders for the death of their president and the dissolution of their government. For the most part, Septhian High Command kept the Marauders out of Theban territory—except for Rika’s company.
Iapetus was right on the edge of Septhian territory. Only a scant forty light years separated it from the edge of the ever-expanding Nietzschean Empire.
The systems between Septhia and Nietzschea were, for the most part, independent and unaligned—though one by one, they were picking sides. When the no-man’s land between the Empire and the Alliance disappeared, the battle would be joined.
Given the lack of markings on the armor and ships below, the battle for Iapetus and the Hercules System may have kicked off sooner than anticipated.
“Think it’s the Niets?” Ferris asked from Rika’s side.
“Could be,” Rika shrugged. “One thing’s for sure—they’re not first responders.”
Niki added.
“Not my girl!” Ferris exclaimed.
Kelly took off toward the eastern end of the building, and Rika turned to Ferris. “Check the northern end of this floor for signs of Shoshin. We’re not leaving here without him.”
“What if we don’t find him before they make it up here?” Ferris asked.
“Then they all die.”
“I guess that’s better than us,” Ferris replied and loosened his sidearm in its holster before moving toward the northern side of the building.
Rika wanted to ask Crunch if he’d had any luck, but she knew the man would tell her if he’d found Shoshin. She could still make him out almost two-hundred meters away, threading the piles of debris and checking around the holes in the roof.
Rika slowly moved toward the southern side of the building, where broad windows looked down into the courtyard where the burning dropship lay.
Rika replied.
In the courtyard below, five soldiers had broken off from the group at the eastern end and were approaching the burning dropship.
C’monnnn, Kelly, Rika thought as the enemy drew within six meters of the ship.
Rika didn’t see any muzzle flash from Kelly’s position, which meant the SMI-2 was well back from the edge of the floor—possibly up on the roof, firing through a hole to get the right angle.
Rika waited for Kelly’s shot to hit the dropship and tear into it, but instead a brilliant shower of sparks erupted seven meters from the target.
A blue-white bolt of lightning lit up the night, drawing a direct line from Kelly’s position to the dropship below.
Near the ship, an invisible barrier flared again, then dissipated under the barrage of relativistic electrons. Once the barrier failed, the beam struck the ship, and bolts of lightning arced out, striking the ground and nearby soldiers.
A second later, the dropship exploded in a brilliant display, filling the courtyard with fire and shattering any still-intact windows in the surrounding buildings.
Rika didn’t have to wait long for the enemy’s response. Before the smoke and flames even rose up above the buildings, two missiles streaked out from the enemy ship in overwatch, arcing toward Kelly’s position.
Rika had expected the response, but what followed was a pleasant surprise.
A second pair of missiles flew out from the building across the courtyard and struck the underside of the craft that had just fired on Kelly.
Shoshin, you sneaky bastard!
The enemy ship exploded at the same instant that a fireball engulfed Kelly’s firing position.