REMO
Page 1
REMO
FIVE ENTANGLED TALES
OF SCIENCE FICTION
by
THOMAS A. MAYS
Stealth Books
REMO
Copyright © 2014 by Thomas A. Mays
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author or publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
“Strategic Deployment” previously appeared in The Universe Annex, The Grantville Gazette, Issue #37, Copyright © 2011
Cover by Peter Scholler, of ARMS Media, Budapest.
False cover page image courtesy of iStock Photo LP, under the Standard Content License agreement, altered by Thomas A. Mays
Stealth Books
www.stealthbooks.com
www.improbableauthor.com
ISBN-13: 978-1-939398-16-1
Printed in the United States of America
TABLE OF CONTENTS
DEDICATION
TINKER BELL UNBOUND
STRATEGIC DEPLOYMENT
DOGCATCHER BLUES
IDENTITY CRASH
ILYAMY
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
DEDICATION
To my awesome kids, Isabelly, Gabbylicious, and the Dylanator.
Like these stories, I had a hand in bringing you into the world.
Unlike these stories, you have a great Mom to fix what I screwed up.
TINKER BELL UNBOUND
The muted whistle of a micro gas turbine and the crunch of dry vegetation were the only abnormal sounds as the semi-autonomous light assault tank cruised by on its perimeter sweep. The "Ripper" scanned from side to side on its path, noting every heat differential, motion, and pattern variation in the background of the Bolivian rain forest with calculated efficiency. It was only as good as its programming and the oversight it was given however, and even machines could get complacent when under the supervisory control of a bored and impatient Remote Operator.
Captain Luis Vargas froze in utter stillness as the Ripper rolled by, its guns tracking past where he hid in the tall grass. It would have seen him nonetheless, but the stifling adiabatic camouflage he wore kept him virtually invisible. Vargas exhaled in relief as the tank moved on without pause. The Ripper and its REMO -- safe in one of the UE compound's air-conditioned trailers -- were both over-relying upon some sort of early warning from the Forward Operation Base's area surveillance net, but Vargas' insider had already taken care of that.
The Ripper rolled further down the hill, its armored tires cruising along the trail it had crushed flat on previous patrols. The captain then heard a quick double click over the comm circuit as his spy signaled the next step. The REMOs should all be gathered together in the FOB's central control trailer, with everyone localized, unaware. Vargas' eyes narrowed. There was work to be done -- the worst sort of work that men do -- and it was time.
Specialist Piper Biel stepped into the relative darkness of the Remote AI Coordination trailer and quickly shut the door behind her, blocking off the oppressive South American heat outside so she could revel in the coolness of the REMOs' central control room. As her eyes adjusted, the interior became brighter and she could make out the crowd gathered inside. Six of the company's remote operators were strapped down in their individual REMO couches, skull caps nestled over their heads, their minds far away. Lords of the battlefield, these six were each engaged in varying levels of combat or patrol throughout their little slice of Bolivia, directing either platoons of Rippers, sections of the heavier Brutes, or light squadrons of Hornet air assault AIs, all with nothing but their thoughts.
Around them, all the other off-duty combat REMOs were gathered, talking and laughing, unconcerned with distracting the Remote Operators actively working. A mix of NCO's, warrants, junior officers, they were all well senior to Piper. She should have -- and would have -- simply blended into the background until needed, but Second Lieutenant Saunders was spewing his usual rhetoric, and she could not stop the heat rising in her blood as she listened to him.
"It's only a matter of time until we shut these nationalists down and gain the whole damn continent for the movement. Then, finally, maybe we can have a little decent R & R. I am so freakin' tired of security-zone liberty. What we need is access to some of these Latin honeys. Talk about a squandered national resource!"
Saunders had been going on in a similar vein for several minutes, and nobody was saying a thing to him, though at least the Major looked angry about it. Piper could not keep quiet though.
She stepped forward, shouldering her way through the tight confines of the trailer. "Correct me if I'm wrong, Lieutenant, but I don't recall your access to 'honeys' being one of the Unified Earth's strategic objectives for Bolivia. I seem to remember something about promoting democratic freedoms, equal prosperity, and ethical resource management, but nothing at all about your dating pool. Did you get a memo we're unaware of?"
Saunders glared at her for a moment, then smiled with equal looks of disdain and appraisal. "Well, well, if it isn't our own bleeding heart 'Tinker Bell'. What brings you among the actual war-fighters, Specialist?"
Her eyes flared at the use of the annoying play on both her specialty and her name, not to mention his disparaging of her contribution to the movement. She brushed it aside. "Somebody told me Carlos had asked for all the REMOs to meet in the control room, sir."
Saunders smiled viciously. "That's Combat REMOs, sweetie, not maintainers. Carlos wants to get our input on the Unification Day festivities, but I don't think he intended to consult with every wrench-turner on the compound -- just the people who matter."
Piper returned his smile with equal malice. "So what are you doing here, sir?"
His smile dropped and he squared to face her. "You might want to see if your little nanotech fairies can fix that smart mouth of yours."
"No, sir. There's strict rules against using my remotes on humans. Lower life-forms are no problem, though. Maybe I can get them to find your -"
"Enough!" The Major's voice cut through their growing argument and what little chatter remained. "Staff Sergeant Daniels, please counsel your soldier on proper deference and respect. LT Saunders, get your ignorant ass over here."
A firm hand gripped Piper's arm and drew her outside, though she and Saunders continued to glare at one another until the trailer's door slammed in her face. She turned on Staff Sergeant Daniels, who let her go and looked back at her with his arms folded, his expression perturbed. She set her jaw and stood at attention, ready to be blasted.
Daniels waited until she started to sweat, then asked, "Biel, do I have to counsel you on proper deference and respect? Again?"
"No, Staff Sergeant! We need to do something about that racist, sexist, idiot butter-bar. I know I shouldn't have said anything, but it's people like him who give the whole UE a bad name!"
Daniels waited again, until sweat was pouring down her face. "Finished?"
"Yes, Sarge."
"You need to let the Major handle Saunders. There's issues there that are waaaay over your pay-grade, but suffice it to say, you want to stay out of the middle of it. What you do need to worry about is how the Major thinks of you. You're smart, Biel, smart enough to jump the enlisted tracks and find your way to a commission, but that's not going to happen if you make him think you're some sort of loose warhead."
Piper sneered at him. "An officer? Unlikely. After all, I'm not a 'warfighter', I'm just a maintainer."
Daniels laughed, and reached down to grab up her rifle and her maintenance pack, which she had left outside. He handed them over, smiling. "Not to insult the force multiplication p
rovided by our REMOs, but I’d be careful throwing around the title of ‘war-fighter’ to guys that play video games with their mind. The only reason they’re in-country is the lightspeed lag between satellites and the Bolivians’ long-range jamming capability. Trust me, as soldiers go, I'd rank you above Saunders any day."
She took the pack and slid it onto her back, cinching the straps tight. She reached down and shouldered her caseless carbine as well. "Even so, I don't think I'd make a good O. I believe in the mission and all, but . . . ." Piper gestured to the blazing hot, overgrown forest just beyond the perimeter fence. "I don't know if I believe enough to order people to take somebody's country from them, just to 'manage their resources for the future'. I mean, is that even our right?"
Daniels shrugged and grabbed the door handle to go back inside. "It's not even as clear-cut as that, Biel. It never is, but leave those questions for the statesmen. All you have to remember is that we're your people, your family, and when it comes down to it, you'll fight for us, because everyone's counting on you to do so. Same goes for the other side, of course, but that doesn't stop them from being the enemy and trying to kill you first. Trust me, moral quandaries have a way of solving themselves when the tracer rounds start working your way."
He returned inside. Piper shook her head, stepped down the short steps of the elevated trailer, and stalked away.
Captain Vargas keyed his comm three times in quick succession, passing their spy's signal to his men. He rose to his knees and zoomed his targeting reticule out to take the entire Unified Earth compound into view. Behind him, men popped out from the tree line and took aim on the Ripper and the various structures of the FOB.
Shoulder-launched hyper-velocity missiles lanced outward, their attack marked by cracks of lightning and ionized trails of tortured air which suddenly appeared between the launchers and their targets. The abrupt snaps of their launch were followed closely by the deeper roars of multiple explosions around the compound.
The first kinetic strike blasted the Ripper down the hill, but the tank struggled to turn back, to take aim on its attackers. A second HVM cracked it open, detonating its magazines in an explosion that shook the hill like the footfall of a god.
The FOB's trailers and prefab buildings proved less resilient. HVMs struck the communications trailer, barracks, armory, sheds, and depots. Though every one of the HVMs were “up-translated” alike, undergoing a step-wise, near instantaneous acceleration to 6000 meters per second by differential momentum transfer, each individual strike had been tailored for the hardness of its particular target.
Armored targets received a unitary round, its singular punch necessary to shatter the objective's crystal laminate shell. Unitary rounds would be wasted on the flimsy trailers, though, tending to pass right through with little transfer of energy or damage. Filament rounds were more appropriate there.
A single one of those thrashed the REMO controllers' trailer, but it was more than sufficient. Just before it struck, the missile broke up into a cloud of tungsten filaments, converting its massive kinetic energy into thermal bloom and explosive overpressure. The shockwave leveled the little trailer and everyone inside.
Piper had walked no more than thirty meters away when everything went to hell. Overpressure from the hit on the REMO trailer struck her in the back and sent her tumbling through the air. She slammed into the ground and rolled, flipping end over end until she came to a stop in a clump of tall grasses, out of the way of the explosions blossoming throughout the camp.
Consciousness faded in and out.
Smoke and dust boiled up from the FOB. Vargas rose to a crouch, his head sticking slightly above the dry grass. He worried briefly about how the fires they had started might spread, but then refocused on their mission. With a wave of his hand, he and his men started forward, moving quickly, but carefully, covering one another in case there had been more on patrol than that single Ripper.
Then the pain hit. Every nerve ending screamed as if someone had dipped him into liquid flame. His men all collapsed, writhing upon the ground, rendered helpless by the compound's belated defenses.
Vargas keyed his comm, forcing out a strangled plea. "Carlos, the MAD is on. Shut. It. Down."
Piper groaned and tried to get her bearings. The whole compound was on fire, bunkers and trailers flattened into debris. Nothing moved, everyone having been driven inside the now collapsed structures by the oppressive heat. She realized she might be the only one left alive.
She rolled to her stomach and looked around, trying to catch sight of any sort of movement, from either their inbound attackers or her own people trying to rally. She almost cried out in relief when Carlos appeared, unharmed, but something about their loyal supply liaison from the nearby village kept her quiet.
Carlos ran to the burning remains of the Headquarters trailer and searched among the clustered service modules that had been assembled next to it. He pulled a pistol and took aim on the large power-conditioning module for the Microwave Area Denial system. The stocky villager fired over and over into the module, until it sparked and smoke began to pour out.
Piper used the opportunity to crawl out of the open while his attention was occupied. She looked for her carbine, cursed softly when it failed to appear, and then sought out a decent place to hide. She saw some large debris scattered across the entrance of a small culvert and figured it might work out. Wincing as every joint screamed in protest, Piper climbed into the culvert and pulled a piece of sheet metal across the opening.
She looked out of a crack in the aluminum and tried not to cry. I'm not a fighter, I'm just a maintainer. I'm not a fighter . . . .
Vargas stood and threw back the sealed hood of his adiabatic camo with a sigh of relief. Compared to the interior of the thermally insulated suit, the outside was pleasantly cool. He looked over the devastation he and his men had wrought and shook his head at its terrible necessity. He would rather have been home, relaxing beneath a fan and nursing a cold beer, perhaps contemplating the coolness of evening and the touch of his wife. But it was not to be. His beloved Bolivia was in danger, and he had to answer the call against these resource-mongers.
The captain turned to his men. "Fan out! Secure the area, count the bodies, and see if we can salvage anything. Work quickly! It won't be long before the Unies begin to notice their ops bases dropping off the map."
Vargas watched his men spread out among the destruction of the imperial compound, combing through the wreckage. Their search was interspersed with the occasional crack of rifles being fired. They had a long, fast march back to their extraction point. That meant there was no room for prisoners.
Carlos approached, looking sheepish.
Vargas shook his head. "Thank you so very much for making sure the automated defenses were down. That was less than pleasant."
"My deepest apologies, Captain," Carlos said, practically bowing. "I did turn it all off, but it must have been reset by your attack on the base. No permanent harm, I hope?"
Vargas' eyes narrowed. "Two men are still in shock. You'll have to put them up in your village until they recover, but no, there's nothing permanent. Other than that, this has been a flawless operation. Did we get all the remote operators? All eighteen?"
"I guarantee it, sir. I had all three sections of Combat REMOs and their supervisors meet in the control room, with the Maintenance REMO as well. Their AI platoons and squadrons should all be operating independently, making them far more limited, even vulnerable I hope."
"Our fat, lazy generals will be pleased." Vargas spat on the ground in disgust. "Everyone fears the mighty metallic monsters of the UE, but the Unies would've never gotten a foothold here if our 'heroic leadership' had just met them in force instead of cowering from legends of their prowess."
The captain looked around. The death toll was high, more marks against the ledger of his life. It was hard to feel much sympathy, though -- not for these "warriors" who used machines to insulate them from the horrors of combat.
Carlos rendered a sloppy salute and went off toward the center of the compound. Vargas walked along the periphery of the base, but then turned sharply to the interior when he heard the first cries of agony. He started running toward the screams.
Second Lieutenant Saunders lay on the ground, helpless, crying out in pain. One of the Bolivian soldiers stood over him, a booted foot grinding upon the lieutenant's bloody abdomen.
The soldier grinned maniacally. "The other planets weren't enough for you, you had to have all of Earth as well? Well how does war feel, you imperialist pig? Where are your Rippers now? Where are your Hornets? How can you call yourself a warrior without your robots to kill for you?"
Vargas came running up from behind and drew his pistol. He put a single round through Saunders' forehead, ending his screams abruptly. The soldier turned around, shocked, only to meet the pistol's slide as Vargas swung it into his face. His nose shattered and the soldier fell to the ground next to Saunders' corpse.
"Get up, you fool," his captain growled. "You're my man, not some dog. I won't stand for you torturing the enemy. We are here for a job and we will do it as professionals, free of all passions. These people were soldiers, just like us. They came here on orders, just as you would if I ordered it. And if you hurt them needlessly, I will hurt you in equal measure. Do I make myself clear?"
"Yes, Captain Vargas, sir!" The soldier struggled to his feet, cupping his nose and trying to stand at attention.