by Isaac Hooke
Three of the Phasers sliced outward with their swords, cutting through a trio of support pillars, which promptly toppled.
“They’re trying to destabilizing the chamber,” Aria said.
“I know,” Jason said. “Which is why we have to get out of here, and now!”
Jason thought he heard a yelp behind him, but dismissed it as a figment of his imagination.
He hurried toward the far side, where the escape tunnel was located.
Jason glanced at his overhead map. The Explorer had scouted well ahead, and so far hadn’t encountered any resistance. That was good. Aria, meanwhile, had already sent in the five tanks she kept on this level. Xin and Sophie were on point, ahead of those tanks, followed by the Rex Wolves. There were only three dots marking the dogs.
There should have been four.
He reached Lori and Tara, who were waiting near the entrance to the escape tunnel.
“Where’s Runt?” Jason asked Lori. “He’s not showing up on the overhead map.”
“I thought he was with you!” The distress on Lori’s avatar was obvious.
He remembered the yelp he’d heard behind him. “Get going.”
He turned back.
“We’re not going without you!” Tara said.
“Fine,” Jason said. “Cover me. Tara, fire your laser to trigger the phase mechanism. Lori, Aria, follow up with plasma and lightning bolts to take them down when they phase back in.”
He headed to the right, following the wall, and then dashed inward, following an aisle formed by the pillars. There were only a few mechs in sight up ahead. They were slashing into the pillars as they went, further destabilizing the structure.
Jason unleashed his laser, following up with his railgun—his power levels were too low to use the energy weapon at the moment.
The mechs took the impacts when they phased back in, but the railgun wasn’t able to penetrate the armor. He’d seen that already above, but it did at least damage them. Or so he hoped.
He ducked behind another pillar as more mechs came into view to return fire. A thick lightning bolt traveled down the aisle and struck the far wall.
He slowly made his way forward, ducking behind pillars along the way, until he reached the enemy ranks. He tore off the arm of one of the Phasers he’d shot down earlier, and used it as a hilt to swing the blade connected to that arm. In the cramped aisle between pillars, he attacked the mechs with that sword. Sometimes the tangos phased out, sometimes they blocked the blades with their own weapons. In either case, he sometimes followed up with a Hellhawk attack, launching the rockets at close to point blank range. The explosion often forced him backward, but it ripped open their weaker hulls. Other times, when they phased out, he slammed his sword into the chest areas, catching them as they phased back in. Occasionally he was even able to penetrate the defenses of those mechs that didn’t phase out, and plunge his blade into their chests—Bullet Time helped with that. Lightning and plasma bolts from Aria and Lori occasionally entered the mix, saving him from potentially deadly strikes when he was caught off guard.
In that way, he made his way to the far side of the room.
Then he heard a commotion ahead.
As he cleared another mech in his path, and rounded a pillar, he found Tara, using her own sword to battle against the Phasers, which surrounded her entirely. Jason realized she’d teleported directly into the fray. Runt was beside her, his leg pinned underneath one of the fallen pillars. Tara obviously didn’t have enough power left or she would have teleported out of there.
Her swordplay was truly awesome to watch. She easily blocked every blade that came at her, and then hit on the riposte. Often they’d wink out to avoid her deadly attacks, but when they reappeared, she’d timed her strikes to cut off heads, pierce chest assemblies, and cause general mayhem. She was an artist, the sword her brush, the bodies of the Phasers her canvas.
Jason cut his way through the Phasing units to join her, and they fought back to back.
“Hey,” Tara said.
“Hey,” Jason said. “Watch my back for a sec.”
“Gotcha,” Tara said.
Jason reached down and hefted the pillar from Runt’s limb. He hoped the leg wasn’t broken.
Runt stood upright and growled at a nearby Phaser. The Rex Wolf leaped at the mech, and the unit phased out.
Runt passed right through and landed on the other side. The mutant seemed confused.
Jason followed up with a stab to the chest assembly as the Phaser returned to this reality, taking it down.
“Runt, come here!” Jason said.
The animal leaped at Jason, and he scooped it up.
“Let’s go!” Jason told Tara.
They cut through the Phasers blocking their path and leaped into an aisle. Partial red circles appeared on the far wall in front of them, the paths blocked by their bodies. Jason and Tara leaped behind a pillar and into the next aisle as thick lightning bolts tore past.
Bokerov’s mechs were beginning to arrive: energy and laser attacks joined the plasma channel strikes of the Phasers. To avoid getting hit by those weapons, Jason and Tara had to keep switching aisles between the pillars until they finally arrived at the exit tunnel.
Aria and Lori were still there, offering covering fire.
“Go!” Jason said.
Lori led the way into the escape tunnel, followed by Tara and Runt. Jason went next, and Aria took up the rear, holding her ballistic shield behind her to protect them. When she was deep enough, Aria sealed the multiple hatches behind her.
“That’ll hold them for a little while, anyway,” Aria said.
“Not the Phasers,” Jason said.
“Guess we can’t slow down, then,” Aria said.
9
Jason and the others traveled through the tunnel.
The Explorer reached the exit area, and Aria remotely opened the escape hatches. Jason sent the Explorer up into the city, and confirmed that the area was clear.
The tanks, Rex Wolves, and mechs emerged, and raced between the waist-high buildings.
A roar sounded to the south. In the distance, above the rooftops, Jason saw the Dinosaur and Axeman, lounging near the perimeter.
“Tell me again why you picked a bunch of single-story buildings to serve as cover?” Jason asked.
“The sewage system offered easy access,” Aria said.
Jason and the others dashed forward into a section of taller apartments, and crouched low as the two Cataphracts unleashed energy weapons that tore into the buildings, causing a lot of damage—at least to the structures—even at that distance. Rooftops blew clean away, and walls fell, causing entire buildings to collapse.
Behind them, Phaser mechs began to emerge, along with tanks and mechs from Bokerov.
“Aria, activate sector seven defenses,” Jason said.
“Activating sector seven,” Aria said.
Around the exit hatch, defense platforms emerged from the asphalt in the middle of the roads, and turrets deployed on the rooftops. Lasers, plasma and energy cannons opened fire at the pursuers from all sides. Aria had made a quick programming change to the turrets, he noted: she had some of the turrets fire lasers at the Phasers, forcing them to vanish, following up with a well-timed energy bolt to strike them as they phased back in. For Bokerov’s troops, the turrets simply fired at will.
“That’ll hold them for a while,” Tara said.
“It better,” Jason said.
He continued hurrying forward.
The Axeman and Dinosaur were plowing through the buildings from the outskirts of the city, taking the most direct course toward the War Forgers. They were followed by more of Bokerov’s troops, which marched and rolled over the debris.
“We really pissed him off,” Xin commented.
“I’d be pissed, too, if someone was destroying my bases,” Jason said. “We head to Octoraffe valley!”
Keeping low, Jason and the team swerved north through the buildings. They occa
sionally paused to offer covering fire when crossing certain exposed intersections. Jason sometimes fired his energy weapon over the rooftops even when suppressive fire wasn’t needed, just to keep the two Cataphracts on their toes. When he scored a hit, the impacted unit sometimes dove for cover, but most of the time it simply plowed on. Thankfully, there were enough buildings to make the going slow, and the Cataphracts were not able to jump over the taller structures, so that bought the War Forgers some time.
Because the team was exposed to sunlight, the power levels of the individual mechs were slowly creeping back up. Still, the recharge rate was a little slow for his taste. Jason was considering combining with the others, but given the number of support troops with Bokerov, the team would only be even more exposed if he did that.
Jason scanned the sky as he ran, on the lookout for bombers. He also had his Explorer scout watching the different horizons as well.
He received an alert from the Explorer a moment later.
Three bombers sighted. Six o’clock.
“We got bombers,” Jason said, increasing his time sense. His comm would transmit the necessary header along with his voice data to ensure their timebases were synched with his own, so that the girls wouldn’t hear a lower or higher pitched voice coming from him.
“Dig in, team,” Jason continued. “Aria, get your shield facing the Axeman and Dinosaur. Lori, Xin, fire your plasma weapons at will against them.”
“But we can’t do anything against those things!” Lori said.
“Do you best, maybe you’ll get lucky,” Jason said. “Sophie, watch the street, and use your micro machines against any Phasers or other troops that escaped the sector seven defenses. Aria, help her. Lori and Xin, you can aid the two of them as necessary, but I want you to keep firing on the Cataphracts for as long as you can. Tara, sync up your laser with mine. It’s time to take down some bombers.”
Jason aimed his weapon skyward and zoomed in as far as he was able on the section of the sky where the Explorer had detected the bombers. He switched to the point of view of his laser scope, which allowed him to zoom even farther.
The sync indicator turned green on his HUD: Tara’s laser was synced up with his.
He heightened his time sense and ran an ID on the bomber. A match returned immediately—Bokerov had built standard Russian A-22’s. Good, that made things easy.
Jason pulled up the schematics for that particular model and located the fuel tanks. He adjusted his aim until his crosshairs hovered directly over one of them. As far as he could tell, it wasn’t armored any more than a typical Russian A-22. Also good. Then again, because the angle was so odd, he couldn’t be entirely sure, since he was only able to sight a small portion of the tank.
He activated Z.
“What can I do for you?” Z’s gorgeous avatar said from the lower right of his display.
“I need your help destroying a bomber,” Jason said. “I was able to poke a hole in the fuel tank of a bomber before, when it didn’t know my position. But this time I need to destroy a bomber outright. Well, three, actually. Any thoughts?”
“I’ve accessed your memories of the previous incident of which you refer,” Z said. “You used two successive laser pulses to pierce a hole in the fuel tanks, and ignite the bleed off. That caused the bomber to turn back.”
“That’s right,” Jason said. “But this time the bombers won’t turn back because they know where we are, and are hellbent on unleashing their payload.”
“I have accessed recent memories and am aware of the current situation,” Z said. “I suggest poking a hole and inciting the fuel bleed off as before, but this time follow up with an energy bolt. That should release enough fuel to cause a fireball, and the explosive chain reaction will spread throughout the entire engine of the bomber, blowing up the aircraft.”
“Hm,” Jason said. “I’m not sure it’ll work. Assuming it doesn’t dissipate before impact, the bombers will have enough warning before the strike to swerve out of the way.”
“Not necessarily,” Z said. “Because you’re right, when it arrives, the bolt will have only a tenth of its power. But that’s still enough to cause the fireball we need. And as for advance warning, because the energy profile of the bolt will be so much smaller when it comes within range, I’m hoping that the bomber won’t even detect it. Especially considering that the A-22 design is over fifty years old.”
“Unless Bokerov upgraded it…” Jason said.
“There is a possibility he has, yes,” Z said. “Another option is to simply fire energy bolts at the target, and attempt to force the bombers off course. But that can be defeated with random zigzag motion on the part of the aircraft.”
“We’ll try to destroy them,” Jason decided. “But tracking a high-speed bomber with an energy bolt will be tricky.”
“That’s what you have me for,” Z said.
“All right,” Jason said. “Let’s do it.”
He decreased his time sense slightly so that he could adjust his aim, and he waited for Tara’s sync indicator to catch up. When it was ready, he released two quick pulses in rapid succession at the fuel tank. The first poked a hole into the outer shell. The second, of a weaker intensity, struck the edge of that hole, and caused a spark that ignited the leaking fuel. A small flame sprouted from the tank.
“Okay, you said you were going to help me track…” Jason said.
“Yes,” Z said. “Let me perform a quick range find.”
She fired the laser weapon at its weakest possible intensity, and recorded the distance as returned by the reflection. Z fired it again several more times to determine the speed and trajectory of the aircraft.
“We’re good,” Z said.
Jason rotated his laser turret out of the way, allowing the energy weapon to fold into place on his right forearm. Z took control of the weapon and zoomed out, adjusting her aim so that she was tracking the target based on its speed and direction. She led the bomber by a wide distance, and fired a bolt.
“That will do it,” Z said. “Assuming it doesn’t alter its speed or direction before impact.”
“How can you be so sure?” Jason said. “The crosshairs were pretty far away.”
“I’m sure,” Z said. “You said there were two more bombers?”
Jason repeated the attacks on the next two bombers, poking a hole into the tanks and igniting the fuel with a couple of laser pulses, and then allowing Z to lead the targets and unleash energy bolts.
There was nothing to do but wait for the bombers to fly into those bolts. Well, that and defend against the incoming ground attackers, which he did.
A few seconds later, fireworks lit up the sky as two of the bombers exploded. The third, however, remained unscathed.
“What happened to the last bomber?” Jason asked.
“The energy bolt missed,” Z replied.
“I thought you said you never miss,” Jason told the Accomp.
“No, I said it would hit as long as the bombers didn’t change speed and trajectory,” Z said. “The bomber apparently detected what happened to its companions a second before impact, and swerved to avoid it at the last moment. It’s continuing to zig-zag even now, so I can’t get a solid shot.”
“Damn it,” Jason said. “Guess that rules out trying to fire some energy bolts to divert its course.”
“Yes,” Z said. “But don’t worry, it will have to turn back after this run. It won’t have enough fuel to return to base, not with that leak.”
“That’s not actually good, because it means the bomber will just unleash its entire payload on us,” Jason said.
“Oh,” Z said. “That is a very good point.”
Jason surveyed the neighborhood, taking a moment to size up the situation. The Axeman and Dinosaur were breaking through a few skyscrapers that blocked their path to the east. Meanwhile, Phasers and other troops were pinned by the War Forgers to the south. Xin and Lori had apparently given up firing at the larger Cataphracts, because the number
of smaller incoming troops coming from the direction of sector seven was getting out of control.
The Rex Wolves were hunkered down next to Tara, beside the tanks.
“We can’t stay here!” Jason said. “We got a bomber incoming! Retreat, but continue firing. Aria, keep that shield between us and the closer ground troops. Don’t worry about the Cataphracts for now—their line of sight is blocked by the skyscrapers.”
The team got up, and retreated at a crouch between the apartment buildings of this neighborhood. Shaggy ran behind Jason, while Bruiser and Lackey followed Tara. Runt was at the heels of Lori. The tanks led the way with the Explorer. Aria brought up the rear, keeping her shield positioned between the team and the trailing attackers.
Jason heard the high-pitched sound of dropping bombs. It was lower in pitch than it would have been thanks to his continued use of Bullet Time.
“Faster, team!” Jason said.
The Explorer cataloged all the bombs and Jason had Z crunch that data to overlay the impact sites, followed by the blast zones, atop his vision. Large red circles filled the neighborhood in front of him.
Jason directed both arms behind his back, and gave control of his weapon to Z so that she could continue firing at the incoming troops. Meanwhile, he hurried toward the outskirts of those red circles.
The whine continued to increase in pitch. Jason knew he was running out of time. He took control of his left arm away from Z, and scooped up Shaggy behind him, and then took a running leap over a single story building in front of him. The outline of the last red circle overlapped the roof of that building.
Almost there…
He realized he wasn’t going to make it.
None of them were.
10
Jason vaulted over the building just as the bomb struck.
That’s it. Time to die.
But then Sophie activated her energy shield; she increased the radius so that it encompassed him and the nearby units; at that radius, she only had enough power to keep it active for a half second—but it was enough to spare them from the reduced explosive energy at the outskirts of the blast.