by Ron Bender
“You’re gonna need this,” he says.
I barely have time to get it on my head when the rear hatch opens. In seconds we’ve all hustled out. The helmet’s optic system saves me. The first step into the dark swampy field is a three-foot drop. I slog forward with the men around me. We make our way up a slope and into a line of scruffy looking trees.
I am so out of place. I’m fighting panic with every step. I’m glad for the holster. Without it I’d be carrying the gun, and with it in my hands I’d be firing a dozen rounds at every sound and strange shadow flickering across my visor screen.
We stop and take cover in a long line of swampy reeds. I’m shaking as we crouch.
“Well, look at that.” Picasso chuckles. “You covered a hundred feet without killing anyone or pissing yourself. I owe the boss some cash.”
For whatever reason, hearing about an egotistical CEO and his cyber-psycho sidekick betting on my behavior is exactly the thing I need to hear.
My anger feeds into an artificial calm. “Fuck you, Picasso,” I snarl.
His expression shifts through surprise, arousal, and amusement.
“Hey,” says the guy who handed me the helmet, “she has teeth.”
“Good for her,” another voice answers. “She might need’em.”
˜˜˜
I make my way through a space filled with glass paneled cubicles, desks covered in layers of dust and collapsed, degraded ceiling tile. The double doors I duck through lead into a more formal office spaces. Two men rush me in the next hallway. The weapons they’re carrying are a heavy enough caliber that I’ll take real damage.
I step-vault to the opposite alcove, throwing two of my rebar rods as I spin.
The surprise on their faces makes me grin. They don’t even get a chance to signal anyone else in the building. I’ve forgotten how easy killing people is.
The door beside me pounds open, a figure steps through. His shock registers in the same instant as I pull the rebar out of his throat.
My own surprise comes next; the blood drips from the rebar. It doesn’t hang in the air like tiny red marbles.
Gravity.
My fingers flex loudly around the steel. We were been born in space. We work best there, blessed with every advantage. Here, we’re noisy, cumbersome, overpowered for most tasks, and graceless.
We’re nothing more than brutal giants.
It makes me easy to find and hard to kill.
I encounter the next two men with guns out, darting cover to cover, down the hallway toward me. My optical system flips to UWB. The ultra wide band microwave visual lets me see them clearly as they skitter forward.
I don’t wait. I stand and fling two pieces of rebar. The metal rods spin out and then through the cinder block walls my targets count on for cover.
Moving forward quickly, I think I might have to finish at least one of them by hand. I needn’t have worried. I spend a moment extracting the knurled rods from shattered heads.
A heavy round slams into my back. My spinal armor plates tighten against the impact. I turn, cycle my legs up, and ram-launch at the shooter. He keeps his cannon on target and cracks off three more rounds before trying to dive out of my path. My shoulder, chest, and right arm take hits. I tuck and roll early, tracking and matching his sideways movement.
Rebar bristles through his torso. I plant a foot on his chest and yank them out two at a time while scanning more walls and doors for anyone else I can find.
As I move, I can feel the dents in my armor starting to wear on me. The plates grind roughly over one another. A few more hits, especially if it’s large caliber, and I’ll have a bitch of a time maintaining any kind of fluid movement.
The lights go out.
A concussion grenade detonates somewhere on the far side of the building.
Bransen’s voice rings over the PA system. “Well, Lee, seems more of your old unit decided to come out and play. Now it’s a party.”
I make my way to an outside wall. I’m not so stupid as to think that Bransen hasn’t booby-trapped the stairs to the top floor.
“White Lion. White Lion, come in.”
I hesitate.
“Aw, hell, who am I kidding?” Bransen says over my com-link. “Yeah, it’s me. I told you my boss isn’t stupid and that he’d win this.” He laughs. “I’m just glad he likes sharing.”
I ignore him and kick out the window. The casement is standard depth. I brace myself and lean out. There’s another window above and to my left. I test the outer skin of the building. It’s magnetic, but my weight might be a problem.
“Hey, Lee. You better hurry,” he says. “Maggie just woke up and is looking scared. I always knew I wouldn’t make a good father.”
I try to separate myself from my rage. Anger breeds mistakes.
“Yeah, that’s right. I know a whole lot more about you than before. Like I know you still got the hots for Vanessa. You two made a cute couple.”
There’s the sound of heavy gunfire from the back of the building. I hear yelling. I hear silence. I resist the urge to radio my team. His being on my com changes things.
“That would be your boys taking it in the ass. I got a few more men here than I think you guessed at. I’m not as stupid as you think.”
I magnetize two bolts of rebar to my thigh before I latch my hands to the outside wall and swing out. I can feel the building cladding start to peel away. Flexing my ram system, I launch vertically. I clamp back on the wall and scramble sideways as a large sheet of siding sloughs free. I punch through the window and land in a crouch.
My scan shows me see two different sized signatures in an interior office. I can’t quite get a clean lock. They’re the only signatures upstairs. It has to be Bransen and Maggie.
I cover the distance in one heavy bound and burst through the door.
There’s a com-link relay on the desk and a doll sitting in the office chair. The room is empty. Maggie isn’t here.
A hologram flickers into existence.
“Surprise.” Bransen’s face leers at me. “I told you, I’m not stupid. I left the minute I walked out on our first conversation. I know how goddamned dangerous you are.”
“Where’s Maggie?” I’m already backing up to the door.
“Oh hell, Lee, she’s fine.” He looks off screen to one side. “For now.”
I imagine her there with him. I feel my rage building.
“Ya know, I expected you to escape,” he says calmly. “Although, I don’t know how the hell you Houdinied yourself out of those welds. Color me impressed. Yes siree, I sure am. You might have to teach me that trick of yours. Especially now that I’ve got your boys.”
He chuckles. “Oh yes, I’m sure you get it now. You were just the bait, Lee. I just needed time to let ’em get here so I could snag ’em all in one place. You’re obsolete, out of the loop. I don’t need ya.”
I turn and run.
3.11
Exfiltration
It’s a new experience for me to be walking across wet, unstable ground. TopSide is concrete and parkland. Even the outreach center I worked at in university was in the arid Feral Lands, its compound consisting of rammed earth and cement.
This is swamp; it stinks, grabs at my boots, and makes rude noises as I move.
I watch how the man ahead of me deals with walking through it, and I try to do the same.
Glancing at a second man on my left, I catch his nod of surprised approval.
We quietly approach a rise in the wet ground and things under my feet get more solid. We crouch at the edge of the brush. Huge buildings are set in rows across an endless field of tarmac. My helmet visor augments the glitter of starlight off a wasteland of dismantled machines.
I feel safer here in the reeds and the mud, but Maggie’s in there.
My heart sinks. It’s so far away. I glance at Picasso behind me.
He points out a derelict space transport and motions the team forward. The first two men cross the open ground and cro
uch near one of the craft’s landing legs.
He taps me on the shoulder.
I’m next. I steel myself. I crouch and run forward like the others did. I’m halfway across when I hear a series of single shots followed by a loud staccato of gunfire followed by louder harder explosions.
For all I know I’m being shot at. I abandon my crouch and run faster than I ever have in my life. One of the men in cover stands part way to sling an arm across my waist and yank me down beside him.
I shake like a palm in a hurricane. The nasty taste of rising bile has me swallowing over and over again.
Picasso is right there. I resist the urge to scramble to him.
“Wait here,” he whispers. He signs to the team and they all drop into cover and crouch.
He moves forward by himself. I quickly lose sight of him, a darting shadow between the broken transports.
It feels like forever.
“Control says there’s squawk,” says the guy who handed me my helmet. He keeps his gaze focused on a handheld computer.
“What?” I ask, looking around at grim faces. “What does that mean?”
“It means somebody inside is using encrypted cognitive radio on their com-links,” he says. All the heads turn toward him. He shakes his head. “They’re working on getting us decrypted access, but we’re deaf at the moment.”
“What do we do now?” I ask. I can feel panic rising in my chest.
“Gunfire changes things. Until we get eyes on what’s happening, its best to stay put.” He can see my frustration and adds more firmly, “We wait for Picasso to signal us.”
“Why?” I fidget. Maggie is in there, and she’s going to be scared. “What is he doing?”
“He’s a specialist,” the man beside me says. “He’ll get us an assessment and let us know what path is safest.”
Gunfire echoes around the building.
Aside from Baylen’s pistol, I heard gunfire sometimes around the outreach center. Living in New White Sands, working for the PD, I heard distant gunfire on my way from the office to my car. What I’m hearing now isn’t like any of that. This feels more real. More solid.
Under my armor, I can feel the hair on my neck stiffening. The only reason I don’t flinch is because of Maggie.
“My daughter’s in there, we have to get her out….”
The explosions following my words have me jumping up. A solid hand on my shoulder pulls me back down. I look at the face of the man beside me. He looks like the classic father figure on any of a dozen Infotainment programs. The name tape on his vest says Tuck.
His kit makes him out to be our medic. He nods. “Everything is fine so far, but it won’t be if you break cover and run in there.” Only his eyes suggest a military hardness. “So just crouch down and wait for orders.”
Now that I’ve jumped once, every distant gunshot makes me twitchy. My hand grips the borrowed pistol in its holster. I feel relief and anxiety that it’s there … like an addict feeling their next fix in their pocket.
A man’s voice, tightly clipped with a Russian accent, startles me as my helmet activates a com-link. “Situation has changed. Move up to EZ two, I say again, exfiltration zone two. Forty seconds to compliance.”
Someone on our team responds. I feel my control slipping away as anger builds.
“We have a lot of ground to cover, Doctor,” Tuck says as he stands. “Don’t fuck up by tripping on your boots.”
I don’t get time to retort or question.
“Move, move, move.”
The team breaks into a fast jog around me. Tuck stays at my back.
The tarmac is cracked and overgrown with weeds, but it’s still easier to cross than the swamp.
A glowing disc projected into my helmet visor shows where we’re supposed to go. It’s a wide-open space a dozen yards from the building’s north face.
My lungs begin to hurt from breathing so hard, but I discover I can keep up just fine when I give my anger free reign.
I arrive right behind the first man in line.
Three VTOLs, big, like the AlphaTek ones from earlier, thunder overhead, heading away from the building.
Like everyone with me, I’m crouched with my weapon out, turning to track their movement as they pass overhead. None of us fire.
There’s sinking sensation in my stomach.
A rumble deeper than the sound of VTOL engines rises up through the ground. Ripping sounds are followed instantly by a shockwave that rolls out of the building as it explodes.
Tuck throws himself over me as chunks of concrete, shredded metal, and jagged glass boom out over our heads. Fire leaps from the shattered windows.
I’m the last to understand what’s happening. I try to separate myself from the feeling of disbelief.
I can’t.
“Move, move, move.” The team splits in two, and I’m half-dragged along by Tuck and two others.
My mind struggles with the idea that most of the building that was standing there just vanished. The idea of a structure that large, that permanent in appearance, suddenly being enveloped by rolling dust, fire, and emptiness doesn’t make sense. I force myself to look, to wrestle for understanding.
Some of the men are running toward the burning shell. I struggle to my feet.
Parts of the building are collapsing inward. Rippling heat washes across the tarmac, vapors clouding my helmet visor. I pull the useless thing off. I can feel the heat slap against me through the air.
Suddenly I get it. Sinking to my knees I stare at the place where my daughter, my little Maggie, has died.
Tuck is beside me. His mouth is moving, shaping words.
I can’t understand what he’s saying.
Maggie is inside that building. I surge up and forward.
Tuck and two others keep me from throwing myself into the flaming wreckage. My throat loosens from its constriction enough to let the screams out.
“There,” one of the team yells.
I look just in time to see Picasso leaping from a rapidly collapsing third story. He’s struggling to carry Baylen’s giant metal frame over his shoulders. They hit the ground hard; Picasso’s legs crumple under their combined weight.
The men nearest them rush forward to drag them away from the flames.
“Dust off. Dust off,” echoes out of the helmet at my feet.
I’m only partially aware of our slender jet-black VTOL as it whispers into view with a rush of air. It drops into a hover next to us; its ramp is already open.
Secondary clouds of dust blow everywhere, lit up by the fire of the ruined building.
Part of the team carries Baylen and Picasso aboard. I struggle against the grip of three men as I realize that Maggie isn’t with them.
Baylen failed and Basillio won.
My mind goes blank as something cool is jabbed into my neck. I watch the metal roof of the aircraft drift in front of my eyes as I’m carried aboard and then it all goes dark.
3.12
Gone
My eyes open slowly. A rush of panic floods through me.
Fire. Baylen. Chaos. Screaming. Screaming forever….
Maggie—
My eyes open all the way and I gasp a deep breath. As I breathe out, I feel my skin soak with a heavy sweat. I struggle, inarticulate strangling sounds in my throat.
Maggie.
The dim room I’m in brightens and a woman leans over me. “Doctor Hildebrandt. Continue to struggle and I will be forced to sedate you again.” Her accent is clean, every word crisply enunciated. “I think you will rather be awake, da?”
I squeeze my eyes shut and fight to control my heaving breaths. “I’m … I’ve lost my daughter.”
I can feel something vape into my neck. I yell, trying to push her away, “I’m fine. Fine.”
My hands find open air as she deftly steps back. She knows as well as I do that I’m not fine at all….
“Sit up.” The bed is already moving to her request.
Whatever she gave me w
orks quickly. My mind and body feel detached. It’s as though I’m sitting next to myself, a strange third person view.
“What was that shot?” I ask. I feel clearheaded, alert, but removed from the pain, the loss.
“You are not first person I have treated for this kind of shock.” Her gaze burns into me, distinctive green eyes sharp like glass. It’s uncomfortable, how she looks through me.
I try to stare her down, return her clinical gaze.
Tall, regal looking, flawless. Either a lot of money spent or excellent genetics. A born CitOne for sure. No one else could afford to look like she does.
I look away, unclenching fists I didn’t know I balled up. “I’m … fine.”
“No. You are not. But it will have to do for now.”
“Have to do?”
“I have other patients. I will be back.” She leaves. My question goes unanswered. I follow her with my eyes. Through the curtains and past the glass wall of my room, I can see Baylen in the room opposite mine.
“Baylen…”
Baylen would know. Know for sure what happened. What happened to Maggie…. This was his fault. If he hadn’t … hadn’t … everythinged … she would be here.
My anger and need force me upright. I ignore the squawking warning sounds from the med-bed and put my bare feet onto the cold floor. I brace myself as I move. I hurry in case someone finds me and tries to get me back into bed, tries to sedate me.
I surge, an angry tide, across the gap of the hallway and into his room.
A bald, tanned technician looks up from a medical control screen. The tops of robotic arms are visible, deftly moving around behind pop-up surgical screening. “Major Lee isn’t ready for visitors.” The tech spares me an appraising glance. “There are a number of repairs on my list still to do. You can see him in a few hours.”
“I’m his ex-wife,” I snap. I wasn’t intending it, but it’s how it comes out. “He knows where my daughter is.”
Something in my expression, maybe the fact that I’ve ignored his words and kept moving forward … something has the technician hesitate. I ignore him and walk around the screens.
I look down at Baylen. I’m not prepared for what I see.