by TS Hottle
They rode in a cramped cabin of a fixed-wing craft. Suicide and JT both struggled to deal with the updrafts and cloud banks. It made for a bumpy ride that the Goldeneye would have smoothed out. Suicide had handled worse, and JT had long since acclimated to rough flights. Mitsuko seemed oblivious to the craft's shaking and swooping. Partlow, however, looked green.
"Air sick, Chief?" Suicide asked.
The Spec Force chief let out a small belch. "Sappers have me spoiled for the Falcons. Austin, you piloted one in the liberation, didn't you?"
"With Lady Yamato's team aboard," said Austin, not once taking his eyes off his console or the window. "Might have had a soft landing if it weren't for the fusion blast."
"Riverside. You guys were at Riverside." The chief sounded better the more he talked about something other than air sickness.
"Yeah." Now JT smiled. "Got to see Lucius Kray ripped apart by lycanths."
"Heard you took a bullet for that Gelt woman, the one from... What do they call that place now?"
"Hanar. She's the First Citizen of Hanar. And she had just ordered the Gelt to stand down."
"So why did Kray die?"
"Section 11." Suicide hoped her tone would end that discussion. "Surprised someone hadn't done it sooner."
"Crossing into District Nineteen..." said JT. "Mark."
They had been flying over an uninteresting forest with uniform green flora. The trees tended toward enormous masses of interlocking vines. Trails in the forest alternated between dirt paths and walkways carved into the trees themselves.
That ended at the District Nineteen border. The plants took on a riot of color from bright yellow to coal black, some with giant leaves. Others looked like prehistoric ferns. Then Suicide spotted something familiar.
Sickening familiar. "JT, off in the clearing."
He looked off into the distance to see what she had spotted. A vine with stalks and maize-like leaves covered acres of rolling hills leading to a small lake. The bizarre vine seemed to writhe where it had the most exposure to sunlight. JT's jaw set. "Creeper."
"This is Juno. Most of the vegetation looks engineered. Different photosynthesis coloring. Creeper vine."
"Sweet mother of God, what the hell is that?" This from Partlow, who looked out the side.
Suicide looked down and saw what caught his attention. A herd of local animals charged through the forest. Plants with bulbous heads opened wide and bit down on passing animals. She saw one animal disappear inside the plant, which clearly chewed the beast. "Well, that's going to make a ground assault difficult." She noticed the carnivorous plants sat in a clearly defined curve that acted like another hard border. Beyond them, on the inside of the curve, patches of creeper, bizarre combinations of trees from various planets, and the multicolored vegetation dominated. "Looks like the munchers are part of a defense perimeter."
"Can we take the Goldeneye in?"
"Goldeneye to Suicide." Boolay's voice sounded tinny over the craft's substandard comms. "You there, Commander?"
She had expected one of Mitsuko's team to make contact if it needed. "Go ahead, Boolay."
"Commander, the ship is going back to being the Tachi. The Administrator sent a messenger over to let us know the Anna Khirovsky just emerged a million klicks out."
Boolay's use of human military lingo made her smile. "Do they know we're here?"
A hooting sound, the sound of Zaran laughter, came through the comms. "The ship is powered down, and I have one of Lady Yamato's team swapping the transponder back."
"Use the aliases when you contact us again."
"You got it, Lizzy. Tell Kai to bring that ship back intact."
"Yeah, ha ha ha," said JT. "Aren't you the pilot if we get into trouble?"
"I prayed to the Blessed Mother before we left Marilyn."
"We're doomed."
"Maintain comm discipline," said Suicide. "Comm silence unless it's an emergency."
"Understood. Tachi out."
She turned to JT. "Why don't we bank toward..."
"Incoming," shouted Partlow.
A projectile came up on the craft's right. Suicide and JT swung to the left. The projectile took a chunk out of the wing. Suicide did not need to ask. She took complete control of the ship while JT began throttling the engines up and down to manage their descent. "Strap in."
She could hear Mitsuko and Partlow clicking their restraints into place. Ahead, that distant lake grew more rapidly than she would have liked. "Leveling her out."
"Reversing thrust," said JT. It was a gambit she'd seen him use before to great effect, but this time would be a disaster.
"Cut the engines. I'm going to glide her in."
"Ditch?"
"Ditch."
The water rushed up at them. She had seconds to warn them to brace themselves.
The fixed-wing craft skimmed the surface of the lake, spinning like a rock.
Retroact: 416 IE
Naval Recruiting Station, Shandug, Tian
"According to your medical records," the chief petty officer said, "you miscarried only two months ago."
Yun was sick to death of hearing about her miscarriage. She knew all about it. It happened to her. The doctors all talked to her. Her nanite swarm gave her hormone levels to the minute. Not a day went by where she did not see, hear, or feel some aftereffect of losing her daughter.
"Chief," she said, "I know far more on the subject than you. I also have my period again. So, I'd say I've recovered." It gave her great pleasure to watch the recruiter squirm at the mention of her female functions. Humanity may have made great strides in gender relations over the centuries, but men still did not handle the vagaries of women's biology very well.
Most men, she reminded herself. Akrad would listen to her complain once a month without blinking an eye.
The recruiter scrolled his pad. "Three years of freighter experience. Trained on civilian shuttles for orbital flight." He put the pad down. "Miss, understand something. The Navy needs pilots, but the men and women we recruit train from their teens to handle the craft we fly. Whether it's the OA-22 Falcon or a SF-75 Interceptor, none of these craft are the placid freighters you lucked in..."
"I blew a fucking pirate out of my cockpit," she said. "I shot out my own cockpit window in vacuum to kill a pirate. And my late husband taught me to fly."
"And who was that?" The recruiter's expression said it all. The husband, he likely assumed, was some helmsman on a luxury liner, and she was his needy, bored wife.
"Lieutenant Commander Akrad Izumi," she said. "Lead Interceptor pilot on the motherfucking Hancock."
He looked down at his palm, clearly getting some sort of notice. His other hand went to an earpiece. "Yes, Lieutenant?" He listened. His expression deflated as someone Yun couldn't hear told him something he obviously did not want to hear. "Yes, sir. I'll take care of it." He picked up his pad and turned it toward her. "Press your thumb in the signature box. Welcome to the Compact Navy, Ms... Izumi? Cui?"
"I'll go by Cui," she said. "I want to prove myself."
The recruiter frowned. "I'm sure Commander Izumi was a good teacher. And I'm sorry for your loss. But I think this is suicide. You don't know what you're getting into."
She shoved the pad back at him. "So be it, Chief. But I thwarted one of those Polygamists at the L5 Station a year ago. My husband died trying to put them in their place."
She marched off toward the processing center.
10
The craft came to rest near the shore of the lake, but they would still have to wade onto dry land. Suicide hoped for a relatively clean lake. Polluted water on a scale even Earth at its worst could not achieve had triggered the downfall of Walton as a core world. Water poisoning remained a common cause of death and illness on the planet.
The four of them jumped out of the craft into cold, brown water. They held up stripped KR-27 rifles over their heads.
"Glad you packed these," said JT. "The plants alone are hostile."
"Why are we carrying them naked?" asked Partlow. "It'd be nice to have the infrared sites and smart bullets."
With some relief, Suicide emerged into shallower water. Her pants smelled of something chemical. At least it wasn't organic. "If this is Juno-controlled territory, they'll spot the signatures on the electronics cradles."
Mitsuko came out next, shaking her legs once she stepped onto the shore. "Not ideal, but I didn't want to announce our presence if we had to land."
"How's that working out for us?" asked Partlow. "Loot," he added quickly.
JT laughed. "Well, they say no plan survives contact with the enemy. I'd say the whole land is our enemy." As they stood on the shore, JT took out his p-com and shook the water out of it. Then he keyed in the code for their ship. "Tachi, this is Little Wing. Do you copy?"
"Who the hell gives a pilot the call sign 'Little Wing'?" said Partlow.
Suicide glared at him. "I do."
"Why?"
"It was my original call sign."
"Oh."
JT's p-com squealed with static. "Tachi, Little Wing, do you copy?"
"Little Wing, Tachi," said Boolay. "We're airborne and headed for orbit. The Khirovsky is burning for orbit as we speak."
"Copy that," said JT. "Be advised we had to ditch our bird. We're making for Bennaville on foot."
"We read you," said Boolay. "Do you require extraction?"
JT looked to Suicide. "Your call."
She grabbed her own p-com and keyed into JT's frequency. "Tachi, Suicide. We are going to try for Bennaville first. If we require extraction, we'll call. Stand by for rapid reentry if it comes to that."
"Copy," said Boolay. "We're at ninety-eight klicks up. Right now, the only threat is drag."
"Good to hear. Stand by for extraction. Suicide out." She put away her p-com. "Anyone have a functioning compass?"
"I'm getting the GPS constellation on my palm," said JT. "At least that still works around here. Bennaville is that way." He pointed.
Unfortunately, the path went through a mass of creeper vine.
Suicide frowned. No one had a machete. "Yamato, I hate to ask, but…"
Mitsuko drew her sword and sighed. "Partlow, remind me to have the smiths resharpen this when we get back. This stuff is going to be hell on my blade."
"Hey," said Partlow, "at least we can eat if we're stranded."
"Yuck," said JT.
The creeper vine actually did writhe. Sometimes, it would try to wrap around their ankles. Other times, it would part ways for them. Despite the difficulty moving through it, it concealed them from potential fighters. That, of course, assumed Juno did not equip its armed security with advanced scanning equipment.
Suicide made no such assumptions. The creeper might interfere with infrared sites, but they did not completely foil them. She wished now they had camopaint or that fiber netting they sometimes used on Amargosa. The remaining Gelt settlers confirmed that the netting wreaked havoc with Realm sensors, and the intelligent lycanths noted it blurred their night vision.
The creeper started giving them a wider berth as Mitsuko's sword sliced through the thicker strands. The real trick became avoiding the melon-like growths low to the ground or fallen ears of grain and corn.
A loud crack exploded from the left. She heard leaves and a few ears of grain snap behind her. Turning, she saw a bullet had sliced the air head level between her and JT. All three of them ducked. Suicide slowly crouched.
Another shot sounded, smacking vegetation above them.
"Anyone see where they're shooting from?" she whispered.
Partlow raised his hand over his head and pointed back to where the cracks sounded.
Another shot fired. This time, the bullet whizzed past just above Mitsuko's head. They could hear it circle back, however.
"Smart bullets," said JT. "We're going to have to take them out before they get any closer."
"Should have brought armor." Partlow's voice came out low and hoarse.
"We expected to stay airborne," said Mitsuko. "Didn't expect any faction here to have rail guns."
As if on cue, something large ripped through the creeper vine. Suicide felt the breeze. "Down!"
They all flattened as best they could in the ropey vine.
"Speaking of rail guns," JT muttered.
Suicide noticed the rail gun charge made a neat hole through the creeper vine. "He just gave away his position," she whispered.
They all crouched and aimed their KR-27s in the direction of the rail gun shot. Partlow waved his hand, indicating he thought they should fan the area. The shooter had undoubtedly moved. Suicide flipped her weapon to automatic. JT must have heard the click because he, too, as he switched his to automatic. They opened up, spraying through the creeper ahead of them. Their lines of fire diverged over a widening arc. Suicide held up her hand when she heard another railgun charge cut through the air above them. She could see the charge go airborne and come down with a loud thud a couple dozen meters behind them.
"I think we got him," said Mitsuko.
"I'll go check," Partlow added. He crawled through the vine and disappeared. No more shots rang out, and no more rail gun charges cut the air and surrounding vines. It took nearly five minutes, but Partlow called back on his p-com. "He's dead. One shooter. Portable rail gun and a KR-27 with full cradle."
They needed to get to Bennaville as soon as possible. "Any sign of a vehicle?"
"No, but he left us a nice trail to follow. Maybe there's a path he came down."
Finding the vehicle the shooter used did not guarantee ground transportation. It could have been keyed to the dead man's handprint or other biometrics. Fortunately, she had JT with her. The boy never lost his theft skills. "Moving your way. Give us a few."
They found Partlow standing over a dead man wearing black. He had already helped himself to the dead man's weapons and was throwing the rucksack of lead charges over his back.
"Leave them," Suicide ordered. "But let's take the railgun. One is no good without the other. At least we can deny his friends the weapon."
Partlow let the ruck sack fall behind him. "Suits me fine."
"Never liked lugging those damn things around anyway," said JT.
"Oh, yeah. You're the one who slammed himself into a tree first time he fired one."
JT glared at Mitsuko. "Do you tell everyone that story?"
"Why not?" said Mitsuko. "You do."
"That's different."
Suicide accepted the dead man's KR-7 pistol from Partlow. "Enough. Let's go."
They found the dead soldier's vehicle, a four-wheeled barrow like the ones used on Amargosa, only without the rear treads. These had large rubber-ringed wheels that added half a meter to its height. It had an open top with a large-caliber gun mounted on the back.
"Fifty mil," said Partlow, "for when you want to get your point across."
JT frowned. "I've seen a few of these on Amargosa. The backs normally smell like moosalo crap."
Mitsuko and Partlow laughed.
"Some parts of farm life Mr. Austin has not quite accepted after three years." She found the barrow had no lockouts that she could see. Why would they? Walton, outside of Samueltown, was the equivalent of a remote island where everyone shared everything. "I won't need your services, JT. This thing doesn't even have keys or a chit."
"Of course," said JT, riding shotgun. "Those plants back near the border would just eat any car thief."
District Nineteen had once been Walton's breadbasket. Suicide could spot storage barns, the remains of a maglev line, and what had been auction yards a century before, now all grown over. The plasphalt of the road had cracked and pitted, but it only testified to its resilience. She had seen abandoned roads on other worlds that had turned to dirt or broken rock.
JT navigated, using the Goldeneye—or rather the Tachi—for navigation. The road led straight to Bennaville. They passed occasional barrows, bat wagons—the articulated military trucks common on farming colonie
s—and the odd runabout. No flitters moved on the neglected roads. Repulsor-type cars were for wealthy worlds or even poor ones with functioning cites.
They went through a village about twenty kilometers from their crash site. Banners hung from flag poles with a symbol she knew all too well.
"What the hell is that?" asked Partlow.
"Juno." JT spat off to the side. "Damn terrorists."
Suicide hushed him. "We're in enemy territory. Let's not advertise we're hostiles."
No one came out to watch them. An occasional person stood on a porch, young or rejuved, a cold look in their eyes. Many of them sported the Juno symbol on their clothing.
"Like driving through haunted village," said Mitsuko.
"Oh?" asked JT.
"Reminds me of an old ghost story. Maybe Jefivan. About a town where everyone became a zombie."
"Sounds lurid."
"This place looks lurid," added Mitsuko.
Suicide said nothing and tried to keep her poker face in place. Nonetheless, it relieved her to move past that village of the damned.
If Samueltown seemed empty, Bennaville looked completely abandoned. Burned-out vehicles lay on their sides or overturned. Someone had photographed the Russian town of Ulan Ulde during the brief AI War, before the Chinese nuked it (with Russia's blessing, no less). War mechs, the machines who originally fought the last World War on humans' behalf, had slaughtered the entire population and left the city in similar condition. Like Ulan Ulde, whoever had taken over Bennaville had simply moved the vehicles to the side to allow the invaders to move about freely. Skeletons, so old Walton's sun had bleached the bones, lay strewn about, few of them intact. Bennaville had been Walton's capital before its population shifted authority to Belsham.
"It's like Steven Turing took over," said JT, referring to the AI entity that celebrated the end of the last World War by slaughtering an entire city in Siberia, then threatening to turn humanity's nuclear arsenals on itself.