Mecha

by J. F. Holmes

  Surprise ran out painfully. He was moving already, because you never stood still, which was the only reason the plasmoid missed the center of his back and struck the empty launch pod instead. The sun exploded over his right shoulder, the hail of fragments from the destroyed pod a distant rain, barely perceptible through the wave of breathtaking, mind-numbing heat. He had a vague sense of inertia carrying him forward in the same direction and at the same speed, and kicked his brain back into gear, knowing that would mean death.

  He twisted, slamming his right leg down hard enough to dig the footpad centimeters deep in the pavement, his restraint straps biting into his shoulders as if his mech were seeking revenge for the brutal turn. The world twisted around outside his canopy, the readings in the sensor displays turning with it, and his head spun as well, still nearly overcome by the suffocating, searing heat. And when the spinning stopped, he was confronted by a monstrosity from his worst nightmares, its cockpit slung low in a heavily-armored pod, tree-trunk legs bent backwards, arms akimbo, each of them terminating in the yawning muzzle of a plasma cannon emitter.

  It was a Scorpion strike mech, the most heavily-armed machine in the Spartan arsenal, and he knew this one well. He’d fought alongside it, trained against it. For the man inside its cockpit was his former brigade commander, former general in the Spartan Guard, his cousin, the traitor Duncan Lambert.

  ***

  Maggie hated the flashlight. She had no choice; the alternative was to walk through the underground corridors of the palace blind. But she felt as if she were hanging a giant “shoot-me” sign around her neck, and she envied Riordan his position behind her, when she could spare the concentration to think about it at all.

  She’d never been down in this level of the complex, never thought she’d have to, and she was wracking her brain trying to remember the layout from the trip earlier tonight. Nothing was labelled, of course, since the whole point of the bunker was to shelter them from invading troops, and they were coming to another intersection in the maze-like collection of storage rooms and closets and seeming dead ends.

  Was it left, then right, or right, then left?

  She nearly cried out when she heard the gunshot. It was much too loud, which made it far too close, and she fumbled with the switch for the flashlight, nearly letting it clatter to the floor. She found Riordan and pushed him back against the wall, closing her eyes and facing away from the echoes of the full-throated roar still rebounding from the stone walls.

  “What…” Riordan tried to whisper, but she covered his mouth with her hand.

  She opened her eyes and glanced back over her shoulder, catching a glimpse of a flickering light from around the corner to their right. She leaned in close to Riordan’s ear, hissing just barely loud enough to be audible.

  “Stay here,” she told him. “If…when I come back, I’ll say your name. If you don’t hear me calling you, I want you to shoot whoever comes around the corner. You understand me? Empty the magazine if you see a light coming around that corner and I don’t call your name.”

  “I understand,” he said, sounding perhaps a bit relieved she hadn’t asked him to go with her.

  The glow ahead had disappeared, throwing the T-intersection back into full darkness, but she still didn’t switch on her light. Instead, she felt the wall and let it guide her around the corner, taking small steps and listening intently. There was no sound, no scrape of boots on the floor or hiss of breath other than her own tightly-controlled gasps. She began to wonder if she’d underestimated how far away the gunshot had been, if maybe she should turn around, when her foot touched the body.

  Even in the inky blackness, she recognized the give of human flesh against the toe of her shoe. She bit back the exclamation trying to claw its way out and slowly, carefully knelt down beside the body. She risked the flashlight, deciding it was worth it on the chance he might still be alive, or might have a communications link she could use to call for help. Trying to keep it low and shield it with her body from the direction she believed Blake had gone, she winced in anticipation and hit the switch. The guard was one of the women, but she couldn’t tell which one; there wasn’t enough left of her face for that.

  Clenching her teeth tight, she played the beam down the soldier’s body, searching for a weapon or a link, but found nothing. She swore softly and was about to push herself up when she felt the cold metal of a gun barrel pressing against the back of her head. Blake’s voice growled less than a meter behind her.

  “Give me my gun back, you bitch.”

  ***

  Jaimie Brannigan had seconds to live and was determined not to waste them feeling sorry for himself. He slugged his brain into motion, analyzing the Scorpion and the man inside. The weakness of plasma guns was the recycle time for the capacitors, and the right-hand cannon was still glowing red where it had fired. Duncan would be trying to line up the left, but the man was right-handed himself, which might give Jaimie just enough time.

  The missile launcher was gone, the ETC cannon was swung out far to the right, but that left the Vulcan 30mm mounted on the Sentinel’s left forearm. It couldn’t penetrate the Scorpion’s thick armor, but he was almost at contact distance… He targeted the emitter of Duncan’s left-hand plasma gun and held the trigger down. Tracers erupted from the Vulcan like the sound of God clearing his throat, and the fire-hose stream of tantalum-core slugs went right into the emitter of the plasma weapon. Sparks and flame and shattered bits of electromagnetic coil spewed from the end of the gun, and the Scorpion jerked backward almost as if it were alive and the wound had caused it pain.

  The Vulcan was still spinning dry, the hopper gone empty, but Jaimie couldn’t seem to relax his finger on the trigger, couldn’t unclench his fists. He advanced on the Scorpion, crossing the twenty meters between them in three lunging steps. The surviving plasma gun would be ready to fire by now, the huge, pendulous arm coming back around, and all he had to block it was his ETC cannon. The barrel extended two meters past the end of the Sentinel’s arm, and he jabbed it out like a police baton, catching the Scorpion’s right arm at the elbow joint…and firing.

  The world exploded.

  ***

  Colonel Blake took the gun belt from her hand and tossed it over his shoulder, keeping his pistol trained on her, its accessory light glaring in her eyes. She couldn’t see his face past it, couldn’t tell if he was angry or gleeful or impatient. When he spoke, his words were clipped and businesslike.

  “Get up. Turn around and head back to the bunker.”

  “Jaimie won’t join you,” she warned him, coming to her feet, hands held up at her shoulders, mind churning beneath the calm exterior she was presenting. She could run. It was dark, he might not be able to shoot her before she was out of sight. “He’s too loyal to Sparta to betray her, even for us.”

  Us. No, she couldn’t run. If she ran, Riordan would just shoot her, and Blake would still be able to get to her children. Wait. Riordan.

  “That’s not my problem,” Blake snapped. “Walk.”

  A terrible sense of resignation fell over her, and she wished she’d taken longer to say goodbye to Terrin and Logan. With a long, hissing breath, she turned and walked back the way she’d come. When they reached the corner, she didn’t say a word, knowing if she had, Blake would have simply shot her and taken off back the way he’d come.

  The weapon light attached to Blake’s pistol cast a long shadow ahead of her. She murmured a prayer and stepped into it.

  ***

  Jaimie’s Sentinel had stayed upright. He wasn’t sure how. The thick, transparent aluminum canopy was scored, cracked, and charred so badly he could barely see through it, the sensor displays were nothing but fuzz and static, and the damage indicators were flashing solid yellow where they weren’t outright red. The damaged leg hadn’t given out, praise be to Mithra, but he was fairly certain his mech no longer had a right arm, at least not below the upper joint.

  He wanted to move, knew he shouldn’t be standing
still, but everywhere he could see was stillness. Metal burned, and men burned with it, and where mecha still stood, they gleamed silver with the wreckage of tiger-striped traitors at their feet. The Scorpion slumped before him like a defeated and wounded Gaul before the imperious glare of a Roman general, the right thigh ending in twisted and smoking metal and plastic where the ETC cannon round had pierced through the right elbow and right down into the strike mech’s leg.

  Lambert tried to roll over, tried to use his intact left arm to push his mech up onto its good leg. To get away? To fight on? Mithra alone knew. Jaimie slammed his Sentinel’s right footpad down on the Scorpion’s left hip once, twice, a third time, and the joint separated from the torso in a spray of sparks. The mech’s torso pod rolled backwards and came to its final rest, motionless at last, just as the actuator in the Sentinel’s leg finally flashed red and froze up. Jaimie negligently slapped the control to cut off the alarm warning him his mech was deadlined and yanked at the quick release for his seat harness.

  The canopy motor was fried, damaged in the explosion of the Scorpion’s plasma gun, and Jaimie had to force it open manually, slamming his shoulder into the interior surface until he finally forced it upward. The chill night air was a welcome relief from the oppressive heat in the cockpit, and sweat dried on the back of his neck, sending a shudder down his spine. Sweat still dripped down his forehead beneath his helmet, and he detached its fasteners and dumped it off. It banged solidly against the floor of the cockpit, and cool air reached his scalp as well. He pulled his sidearm from its chest holster and swung out onto the maintenance ladder mounted on the left side of the cockpit.

  He felt as if he were moving in a dream, the fire and smoke and destruction all around him filtered through a haze of unreality. This had been his home, a fortress of stability. Battlefields were faraway places, the ruins always someone else’s home, the tragedy always one step removed from him. One man had changed all that, and he was clambering out of the Scorpion’s escape hatch, his dress uniform still spotless, as if he’d expected to step out of the cockpit of his mech and directly onto the throne.

  No, not spotless. Blood trickled from a cut high on his forehead, down the bridge of his patrician nose, leaving ink-dark spatters across the breast of the dress white jacket. Lambert dropped the two meters from his mech’s hatch to the ground, put a hand against the metal of the leg to steady himself, then pulled it away, shaking his fingers. The metal was still hot, and he’d neglected to wear gloves. Sloppy.

  Jaimie slid down the ladder with the tops of his boots and his gloved left hand braking him through friction, then dropped the last three meters, hitting in a shoulder roll. It hurt; he wasn’t as young as he used to be. He ignored the pain, ignored the black tar of melted pavement coating the shoulder of his jacket and the right leg of his pants, and pushed himself to his feet, gun pushed out ahead of him.

  “Jaimie,” Lambert said, eyes finally coming into coherent focus when he saw the gun. “Jaimie, I was doing what was best for the Guardianship.” He was pleading for his life, but he still kept the same eloquent, politician tone he used when he was speaking to the Council or the press. “The constant proxy wars between us and Starkad would have wound up consuming us both…”

  “Duncan,” Jaimie interrupted, his tone flat and final, “you aren’t going to be able to talk your way out of this.”

  Out of the corner of his eye, Jaimie noticed Crichton limping toward them up the palace steps, a field bandage wrapped around his right leg, the right side of his face a giant bruise, but a gun held at his side. He was glad the old man had survived.

  “You can’t do this, Jaimie,” Duncan insisted, hands held up in front of him, the palms seared red from where he’d touched the side of his mech. “The law says prisoners of war must be given a hearing by a military tribunal!”

  “The fate of a traitor,” Crichton said firmly, face twisted with the pain of speaking, “is for the guardian himself to decide.”

  Jaimie nodded slowly.

  “Yes, it is,”

  He shot Duncan Lambert in the head.

  The body seemed to take forever to hit the ground, and when it did, it felt as if the strength had gone out of his legs and he might follow it down. But he didn’t have the luxury of collapsing yet. His link was buzzing at his belt, suddenly free of the jamming from Lambert’s mech. He pulled the ear bud from its side and tucked it into place.

  “Brannigan,” he snapped.

  “Sir…” The voice on the other end of the line was hesitant. “Sir, this is Lt. Randell. I’m with Captain Cordova’s Rangers. When he heard the reinforcements had landed, he sent a squad back to check on the civilians in the bunker.”

  “Thank him for me,” Jaimie began. “Are…”

  “Sir,” she interrupted, reluctance heavy in her tone, “you need to get down here, now.”

  ***

  “She kept them safe, Jaimie,” Anna repeated, as if it were all she could think to say. “She kept them safe.”

  Maggie stared into eternity. There was peace in her final expression, frozen there forever now, marred only by the flecks of blood staining her cheek. He wet his thumb and wiped them away, then gently pulled the plastic of the tarp the Rangers had brought down to the tunnels with them back up over her face.

  He was crouched with only the toes of his combat boots touching the ground, a millimeter deep in her blood. She was alone. The Rangers had taken Blake’s body away, perhaps out of respect. They’d taken the man Riordan away as well at some point. He wasn’t sure when; he’d tuned out the man’s wailing and sobbing minutes ago.

  Why am I not sobbing? he wondered. The pain twisted at his gut, clawing and aching to get out, but he wouldn’t let it. If he loosed its bonds, he would be its prisoner until it was done with him, and he hadn’t the time for catharsis.

  “It wasn’t Riordan’s fault,” Captain Randell was telling him. “He said she’d instructed him to shoot whoever came around the corner if she didn’t call out to him…”

  “She knew exactly what she was doing,” Jaimie declared, cutting her off. He rose on aching legs and accepted the comforting hug Anna insisted on giving him. “She knew what was she was sacrificing.” He pried Anna away from him, gently wiping the tears from her face with the edge of his hand. “Where are the boys, Anna?”

  The woman couldn’t speak, just motioned back toward the bunker.

  “One of my Rangers is with them,” Randell supplied. “She has kids of her own, and…” She trailed off. Her helmet was tucked under her arm, and Jaimie could see the marks of tears through the dried sweat. Everyone knew Maggie, knew the boys. Everyone had their own grief to add to his.

  Terrin burst out of the arms of the female Ranger NCO and threw himself at Jaimie, his narrow face pale and drawn, little fists beating a pattern against his father’s shoulders as the big man picked him up.

  “Where’s Mom?” he demanded, nearly screeching. “I want to see Mom!”

  Logan said nothing. His face was steadfast, ever the big brother, already the soldier. Jaimie could see in his eyes that he knew where his mother was, knew she wouldn’t be coming back.

  “Your mother had to protect you, Terrin,” Jaimie told his youngest son, pulling him tighter despite the boy’s struggles. “You and your brother were the most important thing in the world to her, and she wouldn’t let anything bad happen to you.”

  The bunker had been cleared out, except for the boys and two of the Rangers. Now the soldiers left as well, leaving the empty space to him and his sons. Jaimie set the boy down and knelt at eye level with him, still holding him by the arms, more because he was afraid Terrin might bolt to go to his mother, and Jaimie didn’t want him to remember her like that.

  “Why weren’t you protecting her?” Terrin asked him, face screwed up in the sort of anger and pain only a four-year-old could know. “Why weren’t you here?”

  “There were bad people out there, Terrin. People who would have hurt you and your mother and
everyone else. I was trying to keep you safe.” He couldn’t meet the dark-eyed accusation, and he let his head hang downward in surrender. “I’m sorry, son.”

  “You’re the guardian now,” Logan said, hesitant and halting, as if he were trying to find something about all this he could cling to, a piece of driftwood to keep from sinking. “That means it’s your job to protect everyone. Like Mom said, they’re your family, too.”

  “Eventually, son.” He sat down on the edge of one of the stone benches and motioned his sons toward him, pulling them into his arms. “But not right now.”

  Then the tears came, as he knew they would, wracking his shoulders with uncontrollable sobs, the boys’ grief inseparable from his own. He’d have to shove them down again, have to put on the face of the guardian and take control of what was left of the military, make sure Starkad knew Sparta wasn’t undefended. The guardian showed no fear, no vulnerability.

  But for now, he was a father, and he was vulnerable, and he was afraid.

  ****

  Rick Partlow is that rarest of species, a native Floridian. Born in Tampa, he attended Florida Southern College and graduated with a degree in History and a commission in the US Army as an Infantry officer. He has written 19 books in five different series, and his short stories have been included in nine different anthologies. He is working on a sixth, new series for Aethon books, a six-volume military SF saga about a mercenary unit called Wholesale Slaughter. The first three books should be out this summer. His work can be found on Amazon.