Machine State

by Brad C Scott

  The navigator yanks off his headgear and hands out commsets.

  “All right,” says Spalleti. “Carson, go aft and help Andrews dump the fuel. Access the lift jet controls and make sure we can use them. We can’t afford any more surprises.”

  “On it, Cap,” he says, moving aft.

  “What about our cargo?” I ask. “Would ditching some help?”

  “It might, but I wouldn’t... Wait, there’s a crate of munitions back there, a delivery for DSS. See what you can do to lock it down.”

  “I’m on it,” I say, installing the commset and heading aft.

  As I hustle down the connecting corridor, I hear her transmitting, “Mayday, mayday! This is RF-312 out of Washington on approach to St. Louis, we are declaring an emergency!”

  “Come on,” I say to Evans, passing her by in the squad bay. Continuing aft, I hustle down the main corridor past the armory and mess areas, noting the presence of one of the crew members in each. Smoke in the passageway makes my eyes water. I reach the launch bay door and enter, scanning about for our target among all the other containers.

  “What’s going on?” says Evans, coming up behind me.

  “We’re going to crash.”

  “What!”

  I locate the crate with the DSS packing slip and tear the lid off. Stacked inside are enough hellswarm missiles to blow the hovership into thousands of little pieces. I’m not sure whether a hard jolt could set them off or not, though they do appear well-insulated by corrugated mesh. Perhaps if we reposition the crate against those others in the corner…

  “Malcolm,” says Evans. “What are we doing?”

  “Get that loader ready. We need to move this.”

  The packing label with the DSS bona fides catches my eye. Hauling gear for other departments is routine, but our circumstances are anything but. I pull a flashlight from my pocket and use it to peer through the gaps in the stack, pulling out packing material to expose deeper in.

  “Ready,” says Evans as the hydraulic hiss of the loader sounds behind me. “Malcolm?”

  A red glow catches my eye, deep down within the stack. One of the missiles. Armed?

  “Fuck me,” I mutter, stepping back, eyes wide. “Kari, get this offloaded!”

  As I rush over to the rear hatch controls, Evans uses the remote to scoop the crate with the loader. “Got it!”

  “Stand well back, near the door, and make sure you have something to hold on to!”

  She moves back near the open hatch, remote in hand. “What about you?”

  “I’ll be fine! As soon as it opens, let it fly!” I grab a death grip handle with one hand and place my other near the hatch panel. “On three! One! Two! Three!” I bang the control.

  The rear hatch opens, air pulling at me. Sunlight nearly blinds me, but by the time it’s fully open, my eyes adjust to the view of brown grasslands stretching eastward behind us. Pockets of water and farmsteads dot the landscape below, the small structures seeming insignificant from a thousand or so feet up.

  The munitions crate goes tumbling out the back with the loader. I watch it fall end-over-end for a moment before banging the hatch control again. Catching movement from the corner of my eye, I flatten myself against the wall as a couple of boxes go tumbling past, light enough to be sucked out by the air pressure. The hatch closes, my breathing loud in the relative silence.

  “Sixty seconds,” transmits Spalleti. “Carson, what’s your status?”

  “Fuel dump completed,” he says. “Lift jets online, Cap.”

  “Then get back up here,” says Spalleti. “All hands, assume crash positions.”

  I hustle forward, Evans preceding me. As we draw abreast of the armory, the crew members step out and lead the way forward, beckoning at us to hurry. Reaching the squad bay, Evans jumps into her seat, and I help her get strapped in.

  “It’s been an honor, Malcolm,” she says, causing me to pause and meet her eyes, conflicted with defiant resignation. “Really, it has.” She grabs my hand.

  I bend down and kiss her on top of the head. “We’ll be fine.”

  “Redeemer,” shouts Spalleti, “grab a seat!”

  I give Evans’ hand a final squeeze before disengaging and moving forward. Entering the cockpit, I strap myself in as the city fills the forward screens.

  “Mayday, mayday!” transmits Spalleti. “RF-312 is going down!”

  My terrified gaze locks onto the two curved stubs marking the former existence of the Gateway Arch that jut up on the far side of the river. Soon to be our side. My eyes follow them left, and I realize we’re in a starboard turn, angling north of downtown and its waiting forest of skyscrapers. The old sports dome edges into view on the right. Sweat stings my eyes as I try to recall the name of the football team it hosted before the Great War.

  “The sports dome,” I say, not expecting an answer. Spalleti and her crew have no time to spare for my nerves. No time at all.

  Fast, so fast. We pass over the river and the boats plying along it, only five hundred feet above its surface. We fly over the bridge as we make the far bank, the cars upon it close enough I can make out the models. Our trajectory takes us toward a large open area fronting the dome, a park dotted with sports fields. Small figures scramble over the grass.

  “Everyone, prep for emergency landing!” shouts Spalleti. “Andrews, ready full power on the lift jets, my signal!”

  “Ready!” shouts the co-pilot.

  Oh lord, here it comes. I grip the armrests tight. The ground rushes up to meet us.

  “NOW!” shouts Spalleti.

  The hovership lurches, nose angling up, as our rate of descent arrests. The ship shudders and whines as my stomach hits my shoes. For a bare moment, as the stored energy in the rotors and thrust from the lift jets almost puts us in a hover, I believe we might make it. Then the nose dips, and hope dies at seeing how fast we’re still moving forward.

  With a world-eclipsing roar, we touch down.

  The hovership shakes and rattles violently to the lurid screech of tearing metal. I rag-doll about in my seat as the craft shudders, the view through the forward screens a quaking montage of the ruined sports dome, a green field getting smaller, a parking area getting closer, and distant running figures. Time loses all cohesion. Then, with strange suddenness, the shaking stops, the screeching stops, and with a final pressure forward against the restraints, we stop moving.

  I look about the cabin. We made it. We bloody made it. I check myself – no apparent injuries, though my head rings like holy hell.

  “Kari!” I yell out.

  “I’m OK!” comes her voice from aft.

  We’ve made the red zone it seems. The hovership slid to a stop on the ten-yard line for this football field. Beyond the end zone, maybe thirty meters away, a handful of trucks are parked. Near one, a man stands with two young boys, all staring slack-jawed, a football forgotten at their feet. Some dozen or so other people mill about, most of them teenagers. Beyond them, I catch sight of sirens on approaching ground vehicles, the emergency responders on their way. God, I hope we didn’t hurt anybody.

  “Is everybody alright?” asks Spalleti. Her short black hair is matted with sweat, her right temple bruised, but otherwise, she seems fine. The co-pilot and navigator both say they are.

  “Well done, Captain.” Removing my restraints, I get my legs under me. A bit shaky, but they’ll do. The emergency vehicles pull onto the field next to the hovership. They’ll be wanting to retrieve us, but I won’t allow them to confine me for medical examination, the bastards.

  Laughter rises from my gut, irresistible. Spalleti and her crew join me, and the thought of how it must look, the four of us laughing in the cockpit after the crash, of how lunatic it must seem, makes me laugh harder.

  God, that was close.

  Evans steps into the cockpit, face deathly pale. “What the hell are you laughing about?”

  ◊ ◊ ◊

  “Malcolm, I must say, I’m impressed,” says First Redeemer Se
an Keeland. “This is how you arrive for duty?”

  I set my coffee cup aside and take his hand, squeezing like a mental patient.

  “Are you hurt?” says my new boss.

  “I’m fine.” The paramedics wanted to scoop me up for transport with the others, but the best they managed was my concession to sit in the back of an ambulance with a damned blanket over my shoulders. At least I’ve got a close-up view of the downed hovership, smoke still billowing from her engine apertures, scores of emergency responders roaming around her. Hundreds of civilians and media types mill about beyond the ground cordon. An air cordon has yet to be established, surveillance drones swarming undeterred overhead.

  “Can I get you anything?”

  “Whiskey.” The shakiness is gone, leaving an adrenaline-junky weariness that the lousy coffee barely makes a dent in.

  “Back in my office, I’m afraid.” He turns to take a long look at the proceedings around the crash site, eyes lingering on the cockpit and the movement of investigatory personnel within. “I’ve already issued orders for a full investigation.”

  “Sean, it was sabotage.”

  He looks my way, a slight frown and creased brow saying he’s not buying it.

  “It was sabotage. All those malfunctions, it had to be. I don’t believe in coincidences.”

  “Only fools do.” He sighs in resignation. “I look forward to reading your full report.”

  I served under Keeland during my last tour here. Back then, he didn’t spend much time behind a desk, though by the look of him now, it’s been a while since he’s led men in the field. The tightness around the eyes, the bitterness twisting his mouth, the air of general dissatisfaction: all tell of never-ending warfare with spreadsheets and situation reports. His tailored blue-black suit and coifed auburn hair heighten the image of bureaucratic complacency, spoiled only by the sidearm at his belt. I hope he hasn’t forgotten how to use it.

  “You’ve put on some weight,” I say.

  “My wife’s cooking’s as bad as ever.” He peers at me past lowered brows. “Sorry, Malcolm. For your losses. If there’s anything I can do, just say the word.”

  “I’ll let you know.” I won’t take him up on his offer. He’s a friend, but not a ‘til-the-end type, too ambitious and by-the-book to let friendship slow him down.

  “We can discuss the operation later, once things have settled down here.”

  I climb down from the back of the ambulance and throw the blanket off.

  “Or we can discuss it now,” he says. “I assume you’re up to speed? Peach of a name they came up with, Fallen Arch. Inspiring. Sounds like a disaster movie.”

  “It was in LA.”

  “Yes, it was at that. Fortunately for us, St. Louis’ repatriation will be on our terms.”

  “Yeah?” I give him my own look of doubt.

  “You disagree?”

  The air cordon gets underway, sentry and tactical drones from various agencies moving in to shepherd the surveillance drones away. I breathe easier seeing no drones belonging to DSS, or any enforcers, though I’d bet my sidearm that the sentinels have people on site, covert agents embedded in other agencies. The annoying EMT that examined me could’ve been a sentinel. Maybe it’s one of those FAA responders walking the long ditch plowed by the hovership, pretending to examine the wreckage. They’re here, somewhere.

  “Sean, this is just the beginning,” I say, nodding at the hovership.

  He shoots me a pointed stare and a subtle head shake. Pulling a scrambler out of his pocket, he activates it and sets it on the perch I just vacated.

  “Talk to Jace,” I continue, “DSS has been actively undermining her. Buying off our informants, sponsoring gang violence, assassination attempts. They might try the same here.”

  He sighs and puts on a bitter smile. “I have talked to her. I’m not saying you’re wrong, as distasteful as the notion is. We have our orders, though, so we’ll be accepting DSS support. Even running the show, we can marginalize them only so far.”

  “You’re the boss.”

  “I need to know you’re on the same page as me, Malcolm.”

  “Like I said.”

  Most of the surveillance drones have fled, but one remains nearby, paying us its full attention. The buzz of its tiny propellers gets lost amidst the general clamor of the crash site – the raised voices, the other drones whirring about, the whoops of sirens – but I see it well enough, hovering low to the ground twenty meters away, camera pointed at us. The scrambler won’t prevent eavesdropping via video and a good lip-reading program.

  I pull my pistol and fire, hitting the little bastard dead-on with a stunshock round. With a brief argent flash, it jerks back and tumbles to the ground, inert.

  Keeland sighs. “You know how much the media hates it when we do that, right?”

  “It’s been a day.” I holster and lean in close to him. “Listen, this isn’t the usual interagency squabbling. I believe there’s a black ops unit operating in St. Louis, maybe the same one that took out my team in LA. Their objective is likely the same: destabilize the zone so DSS can swoop in and save the fucking day. And you know how that’ll go.”

  Keeland stares at me, composed, doing his best to detect the strain of crazy that would motivate someone to voice such nonsense. But I’m all out of crazy. Finally, he narrows his eyes and says, “You’re serious?”

  I raise an eyebrow at him.

  “Huh.” He leans back against the ambulance and braces his hands on the bench I vacated.

  “The enhanced security measures I requested? Did you get the go-ahead?”

  “The mayor wasn’t sold on it.” Keeland looks past me, scanning for eavesdroppers. “Neither was the council. They’ll put their own details on high alert, but that’s it.”

  “Then put the hammer down. These guys are pros, rent-a-cops won’t stop them.”

  Keeland sighs. “Malcolm, resources are already stretched thin. If we –”

  “The Director sent me here to help you keep the peace. Sean, this is me helping.”

  He blinks and straightens, pushing away from the ambulance. “Alright. Alright, I’ll get on it. But I’ll expect a full briefing on this black ops team later today.”

  “You got it. You hear the news about the ruling?”

  “The revocation of standing,” he says, nodding, eyes turned inward. “I find the whole matter fascinating, DOJ so obviously participating in a cover-up on a case of this magnitude. Implies high-level support from Admin. Strange days, my friend.”

  “No stranger than the aggressive timetables they’ve given us. Why is Admin so keen to expedite federalization? Why now?”

  Keeland shrugs. “The economy’s been tanking, they need more tax revenues. And with things heating up overseas, more bodies to draft into military service. Take your pick.”

  “This isn’t the usual shifting of political winds, Sean. There’s more to it.”

  Keeland gives me a look of profound irritation.

  “Yeah,” I admit, “I’ve got all sorts of theories.”

  “Set them aside. I’ll need your head in the game if we’re going to manage this right. We’ll have everyone who’s anyone with teams here next week, all trying to muscle in.” He gives me a look that says he’s about to go fishing. “DOD’s even sending Task Force 1115 to help with counter-terrorism. I hear you know their liaison personally?”

  “I do,” I say. What the hell, it’s only been a week since the Halloween party, how does anyone even know about us? “Samantha Mathis. We’ll be fortunate to have her help.”

  “The personal connection’s a big plus. You’ll be on point with DOD. Maybe you can get them to help with your mysterious black ops team.”

  “And DSS?”

  Keeland scowls. “I’ll deal with our friend when he gets here.”

  I raise an eyebrow at him.

  “I was informed just this morning. The first sentinel DSS assigned to support our operation? Our former golden boy.”
/>   By the sour look on Keeland’s face… No. Bloody goddamn hell, no.

  “That’s right,” he says. “John Monroe. Let’s hope the city survives him.”

  “Let’s hope we survive him.”

  CHAPTER 22

  Here comes that bullet I’ve been dodging all week. “I just wanted to say, sir,” says Reclaimer Third Class Daniels, all twenty years of him, “what an honor it is to be working with you.”

  He’s finally worked his way up to the altar. Daniels still believes in heroes, a fact as enviable as it is pitiable. I indulge in a quick and violent fantasy that culminates with his back against a wall as I alternate between yelling and punching sense into him. Be bad for morale, though. Public relations, too – plenty of people mill about nearby on the steps and plaza fronting the 29-story former courthouse housing our HQ. Instead, I ignore him and peer past the hoverpad toward the battered heart of St. Louis.

  The skyscrapers of downtown stand triumphant amidst a late-morning autumn sky. Hard to imagine now, but two decades ago, the city center was an irradiated wasteland of windowless, ruined superstructures being quietly overtaken by nature. Vegetation spilled from windowless openings as high as two hundred meters up, yet it was eerily vacant of birds or other wildlife, ionizing radiation an equal-opportunity destroyer of sentient life. Today, those same pre-war buildings look nearly as unsullied as the virgin tower finished last year. Even the leaners like the square colossus of the Freedom Tower, its foundation reinforced long ago to deter collapse. Where damage still shows, the scaffolding and boom-suspended platforms erected around it prove those wounds are also on the mend.

  “I’m from Detroit, sir,” says Daniels, undaunted by my silence. “I saw it on the cast, me and my brother, when you saved those plant workers – ’61, the east-west gang war? Sir, it, we… It made me want to join up. Saba 313 would have killed you and the guys you were protecting, but you never backed down. It was… Thank you, sir.”