by Geoff Brown
Lau sat and triggered a holo-display, began working through comms diagnostics, trying to raise Daisy. “We need her hardware!” he said to no one in particular.
Collins returned to the console he’d been studying and continued to read. Eventually he found some encrypted logs and set about cracking them. It didn’t take long with the military software on board his neural boost. “Motherfuckers.”
“What?” Lau asked.
“This breeding program has been active for over nine years,” Collins said, anger starting a hot flood in his gut. “According to this, surveys discovered previously unknown silicon-based lifeforms on this moon, most likely introduced hundreds of years ago.”
“How long? By who?”
“It doesn’t say. They live in warren-like structures in the first few metres of crust. Small, eight-limbed creatures that can reshape themselves and remould their exoskeleton. They naturally generate a tight energy field that interrupts light and sound waves, renders them silent and almost invisible.
“They were about the size of domestic cats, baseline intelligence roughly equivalent to a smart dog, no respiratory system to speak of, virtually no body heat, able to exist in vacuum and any temperature. They reshape their shells to carve through pretty much anything, including rock to make their homes, and consume silicate deposits in the crust to survive.”
Lau shook his head, stared at the floor. “Fuck me. But those things are bigger than cats!”
Collins read on silently for a few moments, flicked between reports. “The fucking idiots started genetically manipulating them. They codenamed it Project: Future Warfare, began enhancing size and strength. They wanted to breed these things into trained warriors, invisible fucking killing machines under Alliance control.”
“Shitheads!” Lau hissed.
“According to the most recent reports, they didn’t understand the brain biology properly and the creatures’ intelligence was exponentially enhanced along with size. They first began escaping confinement, then quickly developed a method to infect the humans and came back to gain control of the scientists. The last entry is from a Doctor Alice Orszulok. She planned to go and sabotage all the vehicles so the things couldn’t escape and then blow the place after transmitting this full report.”
“She was successful in the vehicle sabotage,” Lau said.
“They must have caught her before she did any more.”
“But her message got through,” Hayashi said.
They turned to her.
“What?” Collins asked.
“It’s why we’re here.”
“Why didn’t they warn us?” Collins asked. “Send more of us. We’ve got sentry cannons on the fucking dropship we could have deployed from the outset.”
“Future warfare, remember.” Hayashi shook her head, sighed.
“What?” Collins asked again.
“They wanted to watch us, see how their new soldiers perform. We’re fucking fodder. But I don’t think they realised the bastards had compromised all comms, base-wide and what we’re carrying. We can’t send a signal fifty metres, let alone back up to the Belvedere.”
Silence fell over the room like a cold fog.
Lau punched a console. “Motherfuckers.”
“When have we ever been anything but dispensable?” Hayashi said.
Collins caught a blip on another console and moved to check. It took him a moment to figure out what he was seeing. Then, “Hatches are opening and closing along the maintenance conduits. Several different locations, all leading towards the docking bay.”
“Those things would never fit,” Lau said. “People can barely squeeze along those fucking tubes.”
Hayashi laughed derisively. “Reshape themselves and remould their exoskeleton.”
“They’re heading for the dropship!” Collins shouted. “We think we’re hiding in here safe to regroup and they don’t give a fuck. They’re escaping.”
“What do we do?” Lau asked.
“We have to stop them,” Collins said.
Hayashi leaned back in her chair. “Why?”
“What?” Collins was starting to feel like an idiot, repeating the same word.
“They threw us to the fucking wolves. Or silicon shapechangers or whatever. So why do we care?”
“Two reasons,” Collins said, anger rising again. “One, we’re soldiers and we defend. Two, if they take our dropship, how the hell do we get home? You think Alliance will rescue us now we know this bullshit?”
Hayashi scowled.
Lau nodded. “He’s right.”
“Why are they in the conduits?” Collins asked.
Hayashi stood. “Because the only way to the docking bay is through here and we’ve sealed them out. They’re bypassing. Let’s go.” She tapped at the console Capstan had been using and the southern door hissed open.
“What about Watts?”
“She’s dead weight right now. We’ll stop those fuckers first, then come back for her.”
Collins downloaded the command codes to his neural implant. “Let’s go.”
The three of them resealed their suits and helmets and ran from the C and C, Collins remotely dropping the blast door behind them. Hang tight, Watts, he thought, then focussed all his attention on the imminent fight. Three corridors, two hundred metres, was all that stood between them and the dropship. He called out to the AI over comms. “Daisy, you hearing me?”
No response.
They ran on. Collins hailed Daisy again, still no response. They turned into the last corridor, maybe forty metres and one corner between them and the docking seal. “Daisy, you there?” Collins said.
“I’m here. I’m reading something in the conduits.”
“Prepare to defend yourself,” Collins said. “Deploy the sentry cann…”
The ground between them and the dock exploded upwards. UV clearly showed three glassy serpent-like creatures, three metres long, erupt up from the maintenance lines, tiny legs scrabbling at the broken floor. The squad skidded to a halt and backed up, firing controlled bursts, deafening in the confined space. As they pumped mini grenades, the creatures twisted and writhed like sentient smoke to evade the attacks. Bullets and explosions that did hit their targets had less effect than before.
“Their shells are flexible, must be thicker now!” Hayashi yelled. “They’re adapting to our abilities.”
“Marines, hit the deck,” Daisy said over comms.
The three of them didn’t pause, fell to their bellies. Three sentry cannons rolled around the corner and barked fifty-calibre destruction into the corridor. The sweeping fire ripped through the aliens and howled by just over the marine’s heads, tearing the walls to shreds. The creatures fell in several pieces to the ground and silence sank over them.
Lau whooped and rose to his knees. “Way to go, Daisy!”
“I’m compromised,” Daisy said in her calm, soft voice. “Get back to the C and C and lock down.”
Lau frowned. “What?”
The sentry cannons roared again and Lau burst into a spray of blood and body parts.
“They’ve accessed my overrides from outside,” Daisy said. “They’re on the moon surface and gaining entry to me. I have no…” She fell silent.
“This was all a fucking distraction,” Hayashi yelled. “Move!” She used elbows and knees to furiously snake her way back up the corridor.
Collins matched her as the sentry cannons swivelled towards them. He lobbed a concussion grenade behind as they went, the explosion knocking the cannons back. Their deadly stream of ordnance tore open the corridor ceiling and sparks flew as the lights went out. The cannons quickly reasserted their equilibrium and rolled on rubber tracks in pursuit.
Hayashi and Collins made the corner as more fifty cal fire ripped up the walls and floor behind them, and they bolted for the C and C. They fell inside, Collins triggered the blast doors which rang with cannon fire as they slammed down.
Laying on their backs, gasping, Collins and Ha
yashi listened as the dropship powered up and launched.
Hayashi sighed. “Then there were three.”
“With no hope of escape,” Collins said.
He got up and checked Watts. Eleven minutes to go. He moved to the console and tried to key up a view, any view, to see what might be happening. None of the internal cameras were working, but an external array, watching the skies, was still operational. He tracked the dropship as it made orbit.
Space folded and the battlecruiser dropped out of jump, only a few hundred clicks from Daisy. Collins and Hayashi watched in silence. The dropship veered, heading straight for it.
“They recalled the Belvedere,” Collins said. “You think they can gain control of a ship that size?”
Hayashi snorted. “Why not? They owned us since before we fucking landed.”
“Reckon Alliance has any idea what’s coming on board?” He sent repeated hails to the battlecruiser, knowing there would be no response. “I wonder how many of those bastards are on Daisy?” he said.
Hayashi shrugged. “Could be dozens. How many are still here? How big an army did those idiot scientists breed?”
Collins zoomed in on Daisy as she entered the Belvedere’s docking bay. There were several moments of silence that seemed to drag into hours, then fire belched and billowed out into space as several hull panels around the bay split and buckled.
“Fuck,” Collins whispered.
Nothing happened for several more minutes, Collins and Hayashi watched in silence.
Watts groaned and sat up, shifted her wounded shoulder. “We ready? Where’s Capstan? And Lau?”
Shuttles began launching from the Belvedere, headed for the surface a couple of hundred clicks from the science station. Weapons ports opened along one flank of the battlecruiser and a wave of missiles launched, arcing down towards the habitat.
“Motherfuckers,” Collins said.
The ASH at Ft Preston
Case C. Capehart
By the time Max realized men were in his apartment, it was too late to go for the antique Mossberg 12-gauge under his bed. The WASPs breached the door of his bedroom before the men in suits did. Their automated 30-caliber guns focused on him immediately, but the green LEDs on their bee-like faces were encouraging. At least he did not qualify as a threat. They might have been red had he reached his shotgun in time.
“Lieutenant Maximus Ishikawa?” The man in the suit barely glanced at him, but grimaced at the name he read off the tablet in his hand.
Max slid his legs off the side of the bed, easy not to move suddenly enough to turn the green lights on the front of the WASPs to yellow. “Former Lieutenant. Why?”
“Do you still have a Go Bag, former Lieutenant?”
Max nodded.
“Dust it off and come with us. We’ll explain on the way.”
Max expected the usual pokiness of military bureaucracy once they arrived at Central Command: the intake protocols, waiting for all the leaders to come in, hours of dress-right-dress bullshit.
However, he underestimated the gravity of the disaster that brought him there.
Without even issuing a temporary uniform, Max was rushed directly into the War Room with nothing more thorough than a single retina scan. Ten minutes after arriving, Max found himself at a long table with several men he only recognized from their pictures on the Chain of Command wall in the Mess Hall. General Edgers sat near the front, but he did not lead the meeting as Max had assumed.
Command General Einhart stood at the head of the table looking out over the men. The screen behind him queued up a recorded video for playback. “Gentlemen, less than ninety minutes ago an unidentified threat attacked Fort Preston – a munitions disposal base on Ishtar 4. The attack was unforeseen and unprovoked; civilian casualties have been high. The remaining forces have locked down the lower levels, but it’s simply a matter of time before there is a breach.”
A black and gold-trimmed drone hovering over one of the chairs extended a foldout vid-screen from the front console. A few clicks signaled an interstellar connection, and a man with golden hair swept back in a fashionable haircut appeared on the screen. “General, how in the hell did these attackers overwhelm our defensive drones? My WASPs have taken down Hedge Tanks in seconds. What does this invasion force have that stood up to that kind of power?”
Terry Dawn was the Minister of Defense, the civilian leadership for the Galactic Expansion Force and the CEO for DRAGO, the largest military drone manufacturer in the solar system never travelled anywhere in person.
“The WASPs ignored the enemy, sir.”
* * *
Nikki awoke and rolled off her cot and into a crouch. The flames of the industrial smelters glinted menacingly along the Aerolite blade of her combat knife, reflecting her mood.
It was another dream; a byproduct of being disconnected for so long. They served as a reminder of her intended purpose. She hated them.
She glanced at her wrist and the faint, blue-green digits appeared beneath her skin. It was just before three in the morning, well before her upcoming shift. Relaxing from her crouch, she cast about for the source of her sudden wakefulness. The flames of the smelters put everything through a red filter and enveloped the entire room in heat that only she could handle without gear.
Nothing stirred in her current home, far-removed from the soldiers and civilians above her. The fortified combat dummy she kept in the corner, its grey poly-alloy skin – decimated with thousands of nicks and gashes from a bladed weapon – stood alone in resembling anything human in that industrial volcano.
Still, something itched in the back of her mind.
She walked to the intercom on the wall and punched the button. “Beast to Overwatch, come in.”
The speaker squawked back after a moment. “You know how I can tell you woke up in a panic with your knife out in front of you, Nikki? You always forget how much that call-sign bullshit bugs me when you’re still groggy.”
Nikki flexed her jaw, a habit she’d formed in order to hold her tongue. Sergeant Kaminski was not exactly her superior, but he was the Non-commissioned Officer on Post for the night. She could not back-talk him. “Sergeant, is there anything going on up top?”
“Don’t worry about up top, Nikki. You don’t go up there anyway. Get back in your rack. Or here’s an idea, why don’t you go to your actual dorm? You’re off duty for another four hours and you probably need a shower anyway.”
“Sergeant, can you please just check in with someone up top?” Seventeen years of the most intense combat training devised by humans had prepared her for hell, but nothing had prepared her for undisciplined and sarcastic leadership.
She heard him sigh, and he most likely did it loud enough to come through the intercom on purpose. After a few moments, she heard the intercom click on again and his voice came through. “Nikki, can you come up here for a moment?”
Nikki ascended the stairs and entered the security office of the Materials Recycling Bay. Sergeant Kaminski laced up loosened boots as she snapped into parade rest before him. The office WASP hovered near, its green LED staring at her. He was leaving his post and venturing up to the surface. In past days, soldiers would strap a carbine to their web gear before investigating suspicious activity. Now they simply ordered the closest WASP to escort them.
The sergeant looked up at her and then to the WASP. “No one is answering my damn comm checks. I’m heading up top to find the night post and kick their asses. I’m taking the WASP, per procedure… assuming you don’t mind being on your own.”
Nikki glared at the green light on the flying death bot. She wondered if, within its super-advanced robot brain, it understood her loathing for it and why. Did it look at her and laugh inside? Did it know what its birth had taken from her, or was it coldly indifferent? Which answer would be worse?
“I’ll be fine, Sergeant,” she replied, fingering the hilt of the knife resting on her hip.
“Yeah, just don’t start doing pull-ups on the raft
er and forget to—”
The elevator doors opened and a dull-grey, metallic spike ripped through Sergeant Kaminski’s chest. The segmented spike writhed like a tentacle, whipping the shocked NCO to the side. He crashed into the bay door and slumped, blinking in stunned confusion.
A metallic, insectoid creature burst into the room. Nikki froze as the thing turned its flat, carapace-like head and looked at her with a set of eight eyes that glowed green like the threat indicators on the WASP. She expected the drone to open fire on the monster any second, but it hovered to Sergeant Kaminski and scanned him for vital signs.
Nikki recovered and got her arms in front of her as the swipe from the creature’s clawed hand sent her crashing through the office window and plummeting thirty feet to the cold concrete floor below. Just before she hit, she saw the WASP zoom out of the window to follow her down, ignoring the demon inside.
* * *
“A malfunction? What are we looking at, sir?” General Edgers asked.
The Commander General shook his head. “There is no malfunction with the drones. All remote scans continue to show perfect working order. We think it’s something with the unidentified force; our initial hypothesis is that the WASPs’ AI is having difficulty reconciling the threat posed by them. Basically, the drones do not know what the aliens are and will not engage until they figure it out.”
“Can we fix them?” another general asked.
A pallid man in a technician’s uniform straightened and cleared his throat. “The base is too far away to force a data link without someone on site reciprocating, and no one has done so since the attack. We have no information on the enemy and without knowing what’s blocking them we can’t know how to fix the error.”
General Stinson leaned forward, resting his elbows on the table. “We still have a few human units, mostly Spec Ops, as Quick-Reaction Forces for this scenario. We have absolutely no info on this enemy’s capabilities. Our boys would be going in blind.”
“What about the soldiers inside? They have a whole base at their disposal for Christ’s sake.”