by Adam Thielen
The shouts from corpsec grew in volume as the officers made their way to the fence. Would they climb it? Cho wondered. Surely they don’t have a key. If they can’t get in without climbing, maybe I can just get this done. As soon as her thought was complete, she spotted a woman push through the angry mob of security with a keycard in her hand. Dammit, thought Cho.
Four camera bots now hovered above the scene as the officer opened the floodgate. To the surprise of the throng, Tsenka rushed at them, kicking the gate open the rest of the way, knocking several of them back. They were all so crowded together that the ones with guns and batons had them raised high above their heads so as to avoid friendly fire.
Tsenka moved like a lightning bolt. She threw quick jabs with enough force to stun the officers, if not knock them unconscious. Most of them held a weapon in one hand and swung ineffectually with the other. After she had knocked seven men and one woman onto the ground, the rest of them scattered. Ten of them had guns drawn, and as their comrades moved out of the way, they began firing them with limited success. Cho zigged and zagged her way toward one of them, then spun her body and delivered a back kick to his stomach.
Several needles managed to land, and the shock brought Tsenka to her knees. She stood up as five of them with shock batons rushed her. She moved forward and grabbed two of the sticks as they swung, then brought her foot up and kicked one of the other men in the head. The two unimpeded officers smacked Tsenka in the back with the gleaming metal ends of their batons. The shock was a painful, almost burning sensation. The vampire’s legs wobbled. She turned the batons she gripped so that the two officers hit each other with them. They both cried out and fell unconscious.
Cho shuffled close to one of the two men that had hit her as he tried to swing again, ramming the top of her head into his brow. She threw her leg behind her to kick the last man in that round of the melee, but he leaned back, narrowly evading.
To the cameras watching the scene, Cho’s body looked as if it were ensnared in a spider’s web of electrical wires with a small army assaulting her, but she was holding her own and was now dual-wielding batons. Sprinkling droplets thickened into legitimate rain. Several officers stayed back, reloading their stun guns. The two that were still upright with stun batons ran in as soon as there was room to fight.
Following after them were two officers with only their bare hands for weapons. Three batons swung at Cho. She moved away from one while parrying the others, then lunged forward at the two new combatants with her sticks extended. The shock tensed their muscles and elicited screams of agony, then relented, allowing them to fall.
The battery indicator on both her batons went red, and one of the bare-fisted men attempted to spear tackle Tsenka to the ground. He pushed his shoulder into her stomach, but she put her legs out behind her at an angle to thwart him. The officer that had already hit Cho with a baton once, swung again, striking Tsenka on the back and delivering another nasty shock.
“Mother fucker!” she yelled. She decided this man needed a beating that just couldn’t wait any longer. She dropped her batons, pushed her would-be tackler to the side, then turned and leaped into the air while lifting her knee. It flew into her target’s face, sending him reeling backward.
She pushed past the other unarmed man as he and his bare-fisted brethren plucked functioning batons off the ground. Cho charged at the group of men preparing another salvo of shock darts. She punched the first one as he finished reloading, took his gun, then shot another officer a few meters away. She kicked out the knee of another nearby officer, then pulled him back by the collar of his uniform and grabbed his gun, ducking out of the way of more barbs, then fired back with her own, hitting one of the women. The female officer shrieked and fell forward with her body frozen in pain.
The men with batons caught up to Cho and, as she finished her assault, hit her on the leg, stomach, and top of the head. Tsenka cried out and fell onto her back. One of the men dove on top of her and Tsenka wrapped her legs around his body. She grabbed a nearby baton lying on the ground and jabbed it into the crotch of another officer. The man yelped as he crumpled to the ground. She then dug her fangs into the man she had caught in her guard. Blood spurted from his vein, then down her cheek and chin. The rain splashing against her face diluted it into a stream of orange.
More officers kicked at her head to try to free their colleague, but one of the kicks hit the trapped officer on the back of the head, and his body slumped onto Cho. She held onto him, wincing in pain, internally from the blood and externally from the abuse. Two of the men decided to try to pull the officer loose by grabbing him by the arms, ripping him out of their way.
Then the raindrops' descent slowed, and Tsenka’s eyes widened with a surge of energy. She looked around at the nine men and one woman surrounding her. She wanted them all dead. Cockroaches, she thought. Scurrying about, doing the bidding of a would-be emperor. She drew her blade and arced it around her prone body, catching three of the men in the legs, slicing their shins and calves open. The vampire kicked up to her feet and slashed in a circle around herself but caught only air. The three injured men fell to the ground, yelling and screaming in pain. The other officers backed up, gawking at the blood pouring from the wounded legs of their comrades.
Tsenka turned and looked at the corpsec writhing on the ground. Part of her felt gratified watching them squirm, but a larger part felt ashamed. They were just doing their job, she thought with remorse. Dammit, Cho. After the long melee, the fight was getting a little too real, and the remaining officers pulled their wounded away and retreated back to their vehicles to summon heavier reinforcements. The news bots did not retreat but continued to strafe around the former NRI agent.
Cho sheathed her blade and opened her pack again, pulling out small cylinders. She pressed a button on each of the five devices, and small legs extended like a tripod from the bottom of the tubes. She carefully placed them around the edge of a large metal disc inside the fenced-in section. The area was about the size of a small parking lot, but perfectly round. As she placed the cylinders, their little feet squished against the metal, quickly adhering.
Small red lights blinked on the sides of the tubes. Cho synced the devices with her HUD then moved to the center of the circle and took a knee. Rain poured on and around her, and the wind kicked up every few seconds, changing the trajectory of the water before abating and allowing the drops to resume their fall.
It’s time, she thought.
Episode 17: The Trade
“I’m sorry, Cho,” said the former sergeant to the former agent. “Yi has a point, though. You are not one of us.”
Tsenka raised her eyebrows. “But you are… one of you,” she started. “You could convince them.”
“Maybe,” he acknowledged. “But should I? Listen, Tsenka, I will try to start a few fires, set off a few alarms when we get set up for our demonstrations, but I can’t march us in there, packing. You know what it is you ask, and it is too much.”
Gao turned away and Cho grabbed him firmly by the shoulder. He exhaled.
“You will already be right there,” urged Cho. “At least be ready. Don’t be caught empty-handed when Chantech decides to stop playing nice.”
Teo Gao brushed off the nocturnal’s hand. “Goodbye, and good luck, former agent Tsenka Cho,” he said, moving away from her to rejoin his unit.
Gao addressed the second-in-command of his unit of demonstrators, consisting of approximately one hundred men and women who had signed up and taken basic courses on civil disobedience and small arms operations. They were led by several lower level Ping security officers as part of an off-the-books operation. Teo’s demotion in the morning landed him in charge of one of the smaller units just in time to protest against Chantech’s monopoly and militaristic aggressions.
Fong turned to face him. The man had a constant scowl on his face. Some wiring between his mug and brain prevented him from wearing a neutral expression unless absolutely ecstatic.
&n
bsp; “Ready the drones,” instructed Gao.
“Sir?” questioned Fong. “Yi wanted this to be peaceful only.”
“Cosmos willing, it will be,” stated Gao. “If we prep the drones, we can leave them behind until needed.”
“You’re listening to that woman, aren’t you?” Fong accused.
Gao placed his palm on Fong’s unhappy cheek. “Whether we like it or not, she’s planning to attack them. You know what happens when the violence starts. It only spreads. If you are willing to shoulder the deaths of our friends, then I will grant you that burden.”
“I do not like disobeying orders.”
“You are not, I am,” Gao’s hand dropped to Fong’s shoulder. “This may be the time. The time. Think about that.”
Fong nodded. “I will load them up.”
Hours later, Gao and his men had smuggled coms and even a few physical signs inside the city and made their way up to layer three. It was as high as they could go without a special permit. He led his group toward the side of the platter closest to where their bus was parked down below. They picked a high-traffic work center near a group of paid counter-protesters, set up their signs, and started their chants. Security officers quickly moved in, menacingly wielding their batons, but content to watch for property destruction for the moment.
If that weren’t exciting enough, after twenty minutes of shouting and marching, Gao noticed that the busy bees moving down the sidewalk were stopping and staring at screens built into the side of one of the buildings. Others had taken out their coms, creating their own projections to watch. The scene caught the attention of more people, including that of nearby protest and counter-protest sites. In minutes, everyone in the area was watching a screen, HUD view, or projection of news streams.
Gao stood behind the shoulder of a member of his unit to see what the fuss was all about. He was not surprised, but still he allowed himself a chuckle when he saw that it was none other than Cho. She was fleeing a veritable army of community officers in the rain. Teo looked up toward the sky. The display on the bottom of layer four emulated the cloud cover, but not the rain.
He looked back at the action on the news. An officer shot Cho with shock darts. Gao flinched but then smiled as the vampire simply ripped them out. She then struck the first blow, jump-kicking one of the officers. A roar erupted around Teo Gao. He looked around and realized he was surrounded by dozens of citizens and protesters alike, all cheering and clapping at Tsenka’s assault.
The crowds quieted as what seemed like dozens of corpsec converged on the caged vampire, then cheered again as she charged them. Then they quieted as the officers knocked her down, hit her with their stun guns and batons, and tackled her to the ground. Gao could feel the tension in the air. The working class had come out of their places of work as well as their homes to try to find a voice and then had put their hopes in a woman that had been both deified and vilified just hours earlier. Now that hope was being beat down by the unstoppable might of the Chantech corporation.
But as the numbers of officers thinned, Gao heard a clapping, rhythmic and slow. He didn’t catch who started it, but it spread from person to person, growing louder and louder, drowning out all other sound. The former sergeant could hear it in front of him, behind him, above him, and below him. The decibels exceeded his eardrums' ability to register it, and the sound became a distorted crackling. He found himself clapping right along with the rest of them.
Cho grabbed one of the corporate thugs and bit him, and the clapping intensified. She drew her blade, and the clapping became slightly faster and the steady rhythm began to falter. She sliced around her, cutting open several of the officers, and even through the rain, the high-definition cameras caught the blood splatter. The audience roared, cheered, and screamed as they were driven into a frenzy. As Gao observed the enthralled throng, he intended to seize the opportunity. Instead, he himself became seized with righteous fervor. Gao clenched his hands at his side, yelling at the projection.
“Fuck you, Chantech!” The words echoed like a feedback loop that spread through the city. Teo activated the drones in the bus, commanding them to carry assault rifles up to the third platter. Makeshift Commander Gao ordered his men to regroup and prepare for war. He raised his fist to the air and yelled for everyone around to follow him. His unit and the crowd, including those employed by the corporation, obeyed. Tsenka had shown them that Chantech could bleed, and there could be no going back. They were going to fight, and they were going to fucking win.
* * *
Flying a monocopter around pillars with a vertical clearance between buildings and ceiling of an average of thirty meters was not an easy task, but Drew was fairly sure it would be easier than pulling such maneuvers with a fighter jet. He leaned the craft forward, quickly approaching his target.
His radar detected the signature of the Behemoth, though it remained hidden inside a hangar bay and guarded by several men. Due to the nature of stacked tiers, heavy guns were not allowed for defense within the city limits. So while Chantech security detected Drew’s approach, they were limited to .50 caliber rounds to take him down.
The robot rolled his copter to the left, then dove low and swooped at the hangar. He launched a rocket, decimating the building and waking the giant. The first thing the walker did was turn its eyes to the monocopter, analyzing its weaknesses and memorizing its design.
Drew pulled up and to the right, in an attempt to keep the Behemoth from locking its weapons. He retreated to get some distance, moving behind support pillars so that the machine couldn’t unleash its payload.
It responded by extending large thickly-treaded tires from under its long shell-shaped feet. The mech leaned forward and wheeled itself after the copter, going much faster than it could by clomping about. Drew allowed it to keep up as his copter led it away from the compound.
But seemingly tethered to its home location, the Behemoth stopped chasing Drew and turned back toward its destroyed house. Drew flipped the copter around and set the craft to scan the airwaves for a potential homing signal, but found none. “Must be GPS,” said Drew. He flooded the global positioning signal range with noise and launched one of the craft’s two remaining missiles.
The walker crouched low, but Drew had directed the payload at the mech’s feet. The ground around it exploded and the machine lurched forward. It placed one of its feet forward, halting the fall. It spun up its Gatling cannons and turned around, opening fire on the monocopter without regard for surrounding structures or the city’s support columns. Drew’s action had convinced the Behemoth that allowing the copter to fire missiles was worse than potential collateral damage.
Drew could not react fast enough. He jerked the stick to the right as a stream of bullets ripped into the hull of his aircraft, tearing a swath through one side. The barrage missed vital components but dented the rotor shaft in the center. The tips of the copter blades scraped the metal, creating a howl that carried for kilometers.
With the walker’s attention recaptured, Drew resumed his previous game of cat and mouse, but then the walker fired two missiles in quick succession. The AI had no choice but to precisely maneuver his craft so that the explosives impacted against pillars. As strong as they were, they were still made of cement, and the rockets tore large chunks out of them.
Drew realized that if the walker destabilized the city, millions of lives would be at risk. He knew he couldn’t allow that. As he neared his destination, he spotted a trail of steam behind the copter. The boiler pressure gauge flashed red. Pressure from the boiler was too low to generate power, and the batteries would keep him airborne for another minute at best. The robotic man dove behind an abandoned pizza parlor made of red brick with a steel-ribbed roof, bringing the monocopter to the ground with a rough landing.
He flipped two levers on the dash of the cockpit, then pressed a button and opened the cockpit hatch. As air whooshed inside, he heard the sound of the walker’s feet now in clomp mode, inspecting the area. Drew b
ent his knee joints and sprang out of the hatch, then ran around to the side of the copter where one of its machine guns had been mounted. The levers had released the gun onto the ground. Drew bent forward and grabbed it by the mounting brackets. As he lifted, his sensors warned him that he was carrying too much weight. He ignored them, marched with the three-meter-long weapon out from behind the bricks, braced it inside a divot in the ground, and took aim at the walker, still oblivious to the android.
CHUGGA CHUGGA CHUGGA CHUGGA, the gun roared, throwing several pounds of lead at the walker per second. As expected, the bullets knocked the Behemoth off-balance but left no wound. As the monster targeted him, Drew dropped the machine gun and ran for his destination. A camera on the back of his head activated so that he could plan his movements versus those of the machine hunting him.
Both entities were classifiable as artificial intelligence, but Drew was far more advanced, and he had the benefit of understanding how a computer mind worked. By observing the movements of the walker, he was able to anticipate its firing pattern. As before, he moved from column to column for cover.
The Behemoth’s glossy round emitter glowed bright red. Drew moved behind a pillar as the world flashed white. The walker fired its particle cannon. The pillar exploded into rocky shards and fine dust. Several blocks of cement collided with Drew’s body, spinning him around and knocking him away. When he landed, it took him a moment to reboot his sensory system. He ran a diagnostic and found that his left knee joint had been damaged. His servo did not have the strength to bend and straighten it due to the friction the damage had caused.
Engulfed in dust and with no heat signature, the AI wagered that he had a little time to spare. He reached for his ankle with his hands and engaged the strength of both of his arms to manually bend his leg, then straighten it. After a few tries, he got it to move without help, though the metal ground together, making it difficult to walk fast. He drew his pistol and scanned the area. The giant robot ran hot, allowing Drew to see it through the fog. He took one shot at it and then began to walk to his destination, his left leg dragging slightly.