by Isaac Hooke
“To who?” Tahoe asked.
“The creators. I can shut them out when I choose, but I prefer to let them in. The knowledge they possess... I can imagine the experience feels similar to an AI linking to a cloud computing resource. The understanding… the intelligence… for once in my life, I truly feel complete. I’ll never be alone again. I finally understand what it means to be more than the sum of one’s parts.”
“Goodbye, Rebecca,” Tahoe said sadly.
“Goodbye, Tahoe,” she said. She flashed him a hint of a seductive smile. It never reached her eyes.
“I trust you will delete the relevant entries from your log files?” Rade asked the scientist before leaving.
The man inclined his head. “Already done. I won’t be seeing you again, will I?”
“Somehow, I doubt it.”
Rade and Tahoe departed. As they rounded the bend, they switched to a pretend jog so that TJ could restore the live video feed.
The pair passed two young men in tight-fitting black outfits marching in the opposite direction. Petty officers first class, according to the chevrons on their sleeve insignias. Intelligence specialists, Rade guessed, judging from the characteristic metal suitcases they carried, no doubt filled with the tools of their profession: scalpels, dental forceps, stun rods. Fleet interrogators, or “tactical interviewers,” as they liked to be called.
He pulled up their public profiles on his Implant. He was almost expecting the rating field to be classified, but he supposed that would draw attention. The first individual was an IS-3924, or Operational Intelligence Analyst. The second an IS-3913, or Navy Tactical Counter-Intelligence and Human Intelligence Specialist.
Yeah. Interrogators.
Rade and Tahoe paused to watch the pair round the bend behind them. A moment later they heard the hatch to 2-75-9-C shut with an ominous thud.
Rade glanced at Tahoe. “You going to be okay?”
Tahoe shook his head. “Like you said, it’s not her anymore.”
They resumed their jog.
twenty-seven
The months passed. The Builder vessel completed the construction of the return Gate without incident. No further attacks came. The telemetry probes mapped out every nook and cranny of the system, not to mention the planet 11-Aquarii III, but if further signs of the strange robots or bioweapons were discovered, the knowledge wasn’t shared with Alpha Platoon.
Two destroyers remained behind in the system while the survivors of Task Group 68.2 traveled to UC space. Alpha Platoon eventually returned to Earth, and Rade and the others were given leave. They returned to the base refreshed and recharged.
The months passed in a blur of PT and training. The downtime between deployments always proved a restive period, but the current atmosphere proved particularly trying: the mood on the entire base was electrically charged. Everyone knew another deployment was coming, and soon. And it was going to be a big one. Rumors were flying that the fleet was gathering an invasion force of some kind. Alpha Platoon didn’t want to be left out.
Finally Lieutenant Commander Braggs summoned both platoons under his command for a briefing. The members of Alpha and Bravo gathered in the conference room. The energy among the men was one of nervous excitement.
“You’re looking well-rested,” Braggs told Alpha. “Good. Because you’re going to need your strength in the days to come. Phi Hepti, a Franco-Italian system, has been attacked. We’ve received footage of the invaders, and their ships match the dodecahedral design we saw in 11-Aquarii. The FIs have reached out to their allies, and the UC has answered the call. Unfortunately, Phi Hepti IV has already been lost. The following orbital footage was taken two weeks ago.”
An image of the planet overlaid Rade’s vision: a bright, green, healthy terraformed world. A swath of gray near the middle indicated the human settlement.
“This is the same footage from last week,” the lieutenant commander said.
A new image appeared. The green bands had been replaced with brown, and the gray settlement was pocked with black craters.
“They’ve taken over the entire system as far as we can tell,” Braggs said. “They’ve destroyed the comm nodes and all other FI infrastructure. They attack anything that come through the Gates. The footage you’re seeing was obtained from an FI freighter that barely escaped.”
“Do we know what they want?” Lui asked. “Why they attacked the colony?”
The lieutenant commander clenched his jaw. “The Special Collection Service has spent the past few months interrogating a certain individual with known ties to the enemy.”
Rade glanced at Tahoe. They both knew who that certain individual was.
“According to this person, Phi Hepti IV was merely a stepping stone,” the LC continued. “They’ve taken the colony as their own, and populated it with their robots and bioengineered abominations. They want the UC to give them five more terraformed colonies in adjacent systems, as well as recognize them as an official space-faring nation. Of course, the UC is going to do no such thing.”
“It sounds almost like they’re space nomads or something,” Mauler said. “Without homeworlds or colonies of their own, and they want to join the big boys club by skipping a few steps and taking ours.”
“Were the residents evacuated in time?” Rade asked, fearing a whole colony converted like Lieutenant Vicks.
Braggs nodded. “There were only fifty thousand of them. Most escaped through the far Gate before the invasion force arrived. Maybe a thousand were left behind.”
Rade exhaled in relief. Still, a thousand people with minds destroyed by nano machines...
“We’re going to be part of the repatriation force,” the lieutenant commander continued. “See, the Franco-Italians, they want to preserve the surviving infrastructure of the colony, and spare the lives of as many of those civilians who were left behind as possible. So we can’t just nuke the settlement outright. Unfortunately, we’re expecting some heavy street to street fighting: although only a week has passed, apparently the enemy has already amassed a significant military presence. We’re going to have to retake the settlement on a block by block basis.”
“Shit,” Bender said. “By the time we’re done, there won’t be much of the city left anyway. Might as well bomb it from orbit.”
“You’re forgetting the civilians,” the LC replied.
“Yeah?” Bender said. “I bet half of those civilians have already been converted into enemy robots like a certain former scientist of the Rhodes.”
The LC’s brow furrowed. “How do you know about that?”
Bender shrugged. “News travels on the grapevine. And we saw what nearly happened to Keelhaul, after all.”
All eyes in the conference room fell on Keelhaul, who shrugged. “I’m fine now.”
“In any case,” the lieutenant commander continued. “We have our orders. There will be no bombing from orbit. You’ll be teaming up with the Marines on this one. Once we reach the planet, we’re going to launch a coordinated, beachhead type assault. You’ll be escorting Marine Companies C and D of the 2nd Assault Battalion. Your participation will be entirely mech-based. Each and every one of you will be given a shiny new toy.”
“What kind of new toy?” Fret asked suspiciously.
“I’ve arranged for thirty-two new Zeus class mechs to be transferred aboard the supercarrier Intrepid,” the LC said. “Do I ever do you wrong?”
“Wait a second,” Tahoe asked. “Zeus class? Those haven’t ever been tested in the field, have they?”
The lieutenant commander shrugged. “They’ve passed the controlled tests with flying colors. Trust me, you’re going to love these mechs. Why the disappointed looks? I thought you’d all be happy.”
“We are happy,” Bomb said. “We’re here to fight. We just like tech that we know works, is all.”
“I think you’ll be more than pleased,” Braggs replied. “Facehopper has updated the simulators with the latest Zeus package. Get some practice in—you�
�re all due to report for deployment next Monday. See you on the Intrepid.”
The two platoons took shuttles into orbit the next week and rendezvoused with the supercarrier and its task group. The weeks passed slowly as the task group navigated between the different systems, taking Gate after Gate. Eventually, six weeks later, the fleet rendezvoused with the major battle group in Delta Ceti, and prepared for the final Gate crossing to the neighboring system, Phi Hepti.
Lying on his bunk in the berthing area, Rade stared at the Gate through the forward feed Lieutenant Commander Braggs had granted him. Bender and TJ had been unable to hack into to the systems of the supercarrier, so the platoon was at the mercy of the lieutenant commander and whatever feeds he deigned to stream.
Rade had never seen so many battle ships queued up in one place like that before. The fighting was going to be intense on the other side, no doubt. Rumors had it that the entire enemy fleet was stationed beyond the Gate, waiting to attack every ship that passed inside. Once through, if the Intrepid survived the initial engagement, it would take at least three days to reach the colony, even if it made a direct run for the planet.
Three days before the platoon would see any action.
The Intrepid’s turn at the Gate came. Rade involuntarily held his breath as the supercarrier approached.
The video feed abruptly clicked off.
“What the—!” That was Bender.
“Braggs can’t do this to us,” Manic complained.
Rade immediately tapped in Facehopper. “Chief, we lost the feed.”
“I know,” Facehopper replied. “The LC decided it was better for us if he turned it off.”
“Is it that bad on the other side?” Rade asked.
“Apparently so.”
The moments ticked away. The Intrepid had no doubt traversed the Gate by then.
Rade felt a slight rumbling underneath him. The hull began to moan in the distance, and he knew they were already under attack.
“Hang tight, people,” Rade said. “Our turn is coming. Real soon now.”
twenty-eight
Crushing G forces assailed Rade as the inertial dampeners of the U.S.S. Intrepid struggled to compensate for a sudden directional change. The feeling quickly subsided, but the bulkheads of the berthing area rumbled, and the deep moaning of the hull momentarily intensified.
The others in the berthing compartment said not a word. There was nothing to say. The only thing the MOTHs of Alpha Platoon could do during the attack was wait it out and hope the captain and crew of the supercarrier carried them through the moment of crisis. The platoon members remained stock-still on their bunks, dealing with the feelings of fear, helplessness, and impotency in their own way.
Bender and TJ acted all casual, wearing their best poker faces, the drone operators refusing to show fear. Manic was sweating, the port-wine stain a particularly bright red that day as he quietly prayed to himself. Tahoe had his eyes closed, and he too seemed to be praying to those spirits he claimed not to believe in, though his lips barely moved. The remainder of the platoon distracted themselves in one of the virtual reality war games that was popular at the moment, their defocused eyes and their jerky arm movements giving away the fact they resided entirely inside of their Implants.
The rumbling abruptly flared up as the deck resounded with some distant boom. Manic flinched, and Tahoe opened his eyes.
Something had struck the hull nearby, Rade guessed; probably had torn a hole clean through.
Tahoe closed his eyes once more as the shaking subsided.
Rade tried to pull up the damage reports on his Implant, but he didn’t have the authorization. He’d never know how close he and his team had come to dying.
The current state of affairs wasn’t entirely unfamiliar to them. A similar scenario had played out shortly after the Intrepid had passed through the Gate into the Phi Hepti system three days ago, where a large enemy fleet had awaited in ambush. The rumbling of the deck and the inertial compensator lag hadn’t been nearly so bad then.
After that battle, Rade learned that the Intrepid had been one of the luckier vessels: it had received only minor damage during the initial engagement. Though the enemy outnumbered them slightly, the UC battle group had prevailed, apparently because of the weaknesses Task Group 68.2 had gleaned from their previous encounter, employed to devastating effect: the opposing fleet quickly fled to the far side of the system, leaving an open path to Phi Hepti IV.
The UC battle group had split into three battle units. The first remained by the Gate to guard it. The second pursued the enemy. The third proceeded to the planet. The majority of the starships sent toward the undefended planet were troop carriers, full of the Marines who would liberate the colony, two companies of which Rade and his platoon of MOTHs would be escorting.
The Intrepid had spent the last three days journeying toward the planet with the latter battle unit. According to advance telemetry, the planet was relatively undefended. The two enemy vessels stationed near Phi Hepti IV had fled, and on approach the battle unit shot down what appeared to be orbital defense platforms. Rade and his platoon were due to report to the drop bay in an hour.
But then a klaxon had sounded, and the detached voice of the ship’s AI had come over the main circuit to warn of an impending attack—the planet wasn’t as defenseless as initially believed. Though the means of attack weren’t mentioned, Rade guessed the enemy utilized some form of surface to space bombardment: missiles, lasers, railguns, mortars, or a combination thereof. Either that, or some new weapon the UC had never seen before.
And so Rade sat there tensely in the berthing area, waiting for the order to report to the drop bay.
An order that would never come.
The starship continued to rumble for some time. One particularly loud moaning of steel came from above, and the platoon members glanced upward nervously. Those who were playing virtual reality war games shut them down.
“Anything from the chief?” Lui asked.
Rade shook his head. “Haven’t received any orders to make for the drop bay, yet.”
Another loud rumbling came from above.
“Geez,” Mauler said. “They’re really strafing our hull good.”
“You think the enemy has fighters?” Grappler asked.
“Well, whatever they have,” Trace said. “It can’t be good.”
Rade tried to wear his most reassuring expression. “Stay calm, people. Whatever—”
He was interrupted by a terrible screeching sound. The lights flicked off; an instant later the emergency HLEDs kicked in. The whole world then turned sideways, and everyone was thrown against the far bulkhead, along with any other loose items: clothing fell from lockers; spare aReal goggles and noise cancellers slid from tables. The lockers themselves, along with the steel bed frames beside them, were bolted to the deck, thankfully. The mattresses were similarly strapped down. Unfortunately, Rade was battered by Manic’s portable refrigerator.
“Damn it. I told you to secure that fridge, Manic!” Feeling nauseous, Rade painfully kicked the appliance off his leg, and to his surprise it floated to the far side of the compartment. He felt what could only be a reactionary force, pressing his body firmly into the bulkhead.
As Rade floated into the air, he realized the nausea he felt wasn’t because he had been hit by the fridge.
“Artificial gravity is out,” Trace said.
“No, really?” Bender said.
“What the hell!” Bomb peeled off a pair of skivvies that had landed in his face. “Who’s ginch is this?!” His nose wrinkled in disgust and he threw it away as if it were a grenade. “Got skidmarks in it!” The brown stains of the “skidmarks” were fairly obvious inside the underwear as it floated across the compartment.
“Chief!” Rade transmitted over the comm. “What the hell is going on out there?”
Facehopper didn’t answer.
“Chief?” Rade tried again
“Got some bad news,” Facehopper
replied. “The Intrepid has been cut clean in half.”
To Be Continued…
I don't like leaving readers hanging, which is why I've decided to publish all three full length novels in the trilogy at the same time. That's right, book two is available now. Find out what happens to Rade and his platoon without having to wait.
Continue the adventures in Zeus (Alien War Trilogy Book 2)
postscript
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about the author
USA Today bestselling author Isaac Hooke holds a degree in engineering physics, though his more unusual inventions remain fictive at this time. He is an avid hiker, cyclist, and photographer who sometimes resides in Edmonton, Alberta.
acknowledgments
THANK YOU to my knowledgeable beta readers and advanced reviewers who helped smooth out the rough edges of the prerelease manuscript: Nicole P., Jeremy G., Doug B., Jenny O., Amy B., Bryan O., Lezza, Noel, Anton, Spencer, Norman, Trudi, Corey, Erol, Terje, David, Charles, Walter, Lisa, Ramon, Chris, Scott, Michael, Chris, Bob, Jim, Maureen, Zane, Chuck, Shayne, Anna, Dave, Roger, Nick, Gerry, Charles, Annie, Patrick, Mike, Jeff, Lisa, Jason, Bryant, Janna, Tom, Jerry, Chris, Jim, Brandon, Kathy, Norm, Jonathan, Derek, Shawn, Judi, Eric, Rick, Bryan, Barry, Sherman, Jim, Bob, Ralph, Darren, Michael, Chris, Michael, Julie, Glenn, Rickie, Rhonda, Neil, Claude, Ski, Joe, Paul, Larry, John, Norma, Jeff, David, Brennan, Phyllis, Robert, Darren, Daniel, Montzalee, Robert, Dave, Diane, Peter, Skip, Louise, Dave, Brent, Erin, Paul, Jeremy, Dan, Garland, Sharon, Dave, Pat, Nathan, Max, Martin, Greg, David, Myles, Nancy, Ed, David, Karen, Becky, Jacob, Ben, Don, Carl, Gene, Bob, Luke, Teri, Robine, Gerald, Lee, Rich, Ken, Daniel, Chris, Al, Andy, Tim, Robert, Fred, David, Mitch, Don, Tony, Dian, Tony, John, Sandy, James, David, Pat, Gary, Jean, Bryan, William, Roy, Dave, Vincent, Tim, Richard, Kevin, George, Andrew, John, Richard, Robin, Sue, Mark, Jerry, Rodger, Rob, Byron, Ty, Mike, Gerry, Steve, Benjamin, Anna, Keith, Jeff, Josh, Herb, Bev, Simon, John, David, Greg, Larry, Timothy, Tony, Ian, Niraj, Maureen, Jim, Len, Bryan, Todd, Maria, Angela, Gerhard, Renee, Pete, Hemantkumar, Tim, Joseph, Will, David, Suzanne, Steve, Derek, Valerie, Laurence, James, Andy, Mark, Tarzy, Christina, Rick, Mike, Paula, Tim, Jim, Gal, Anthony, Ron, Dietrich, Mindy, Ben, Steve, Allen, Paddy & Penny, Troy, Marti, Herb, Jim, David, Alan, Leslie, Chuck, Dan, Perry, Chris, Rich, Rod, Trevor, Rick, Michael, Tim, Mark, Alex, John, William, Doug, Tony, David, Sam, Derek, John, Jay, Tom, Bryant, Larry, Anjanette, Gary, Travis, Jennifer, Henry, Drew, Michelle, Bob, Gregg, Billy, Jack, Lance, Sandra, Libby, Jonathan, Karl, Bruce, Clay, Gary, Sarge, Andrew, Deborah, Steve, and Curtis.