Atlas

by Isaac Hooke

  I observed a barrage of rockets launch from the slope behind the Equestrian. I'm not sure where those rockets hit, but the Equestrian hurtled straight up into the air and landed upside-down. The displaced Centurions took cover behind the damaged shell of the tank, taking heavy fire. The command unit of the Centurions, the Praetor, fell in a shower of sparks.

  We weren't going to be getting any help from that quarter.

  The hail of bullets continued around me. Shards of rock and dust were just flying into the air. Along with the communications equipment in Snakeoil's rucksack was a newly developed Node-jammer, which was supposed to scramble SK wireless frequencies and prevent the enemy adhoc network nodes (ie: their Implants) from exchanging information. In theory that meant if an SK identified one of us, our positions wouldn't be broadcast to all the other SKs. It was a recent technology, and I dearly hoped the SKs hadn't yet developed a countermeasure.

  On my HUD, everyone's vitals were bright green: No one had been injured. Yet. Apparently the SKs were firing based on sight alone, so I guess the jamming technology was working.

  Suddenly the gunfire around me began to pick up.

  I'd been spotted. I searched for cover, any cover. My eyes focused on Ladybug, Manic's crumpled mech.

  "Going for Ladybug!" I sent on the squad one line.

  I got up, and somehow managed to make it behind the mech without getting hit. Facehopper, Bender and Snakeoil were already there, and had given me covering fire. Manic was there too—he'd ejected from the mech and was now firing a pistol. His jumpsuit was blackened in several places, and one side of his facemask was smashed in, but so far the glass had held and he seemed to be maintaining suit pressure.

  I took up a position on the right flank of the fallen mech and threw a few grenades, then switched to full-auto to give Alejandro and Big Dog a chance to join up with us.

  We were in a defensible position, but I kept waiting for another barrage of rockets to come in. For every target we took down, another replaced him. I'm not sure how long we kept firing there from behind the mech, all I know is the gunfire never abated on either side. We were using up our magazines at a frightening rate. Big Dog had already exhausted his M60 rounds, and he'd switched over to an M4 rifle.

  Behind us, about twenty meters away, squad two was firing from behind a small, waist-high boulder, giving us support. Lui's mech lay crumpled on the ground not far from the boulder.

  You'd think we could just use our jetpacks and get to the higher ground. But that was the worst strategy in a situation like this. You used your jetpack, you exposed yourself to attacks from all sorts of projectile weapons. In the heat of combat, an airborne soldier was, more often than not, a dead soldier. The jetpacks were more useful in urban warfare scenarios, where you could flit between buildings for cover.

  The enemy continued to advance down either slope, and I realized that they were trying to outflank us. It was classic military strategy: get 360-degree coverage on your target and you will take it out. The kind of strategy we would have employed.

  "Guys, you really need to get over here!" Chief Bourbonjack said over the comm.

  Just then the inevitable barrage of rockets came in, and we dropped behind the damaged mech. Clouds of shale and dust filled the air. I had visions of that Equestrian flying up and turning over, and I hoped that wouldn't happen here.

  A shard of shale embedded in my helmet lens, causing tiny cracks to spider along the surface of my facemask. When the dust settled, my mask seemed foggy. I wiped my gloved fingers across it, clearing away soot.

  "You guy's good?" Facehopper said. He was covered in black dust like the rest of us.

  "Never better," Big Dog said. "You worry about your fine English ass instead, how about that?"

  A rocket struck the right side of the mech and the explosion sent the seven of us hurtling backward.

  I landed, and the bullets immediately picked up around me. I was out in the open.

  I picked up my rifle and scrambled back to cover. Other members of squad one did the same.

  I heard a whir behind me.

  Thirty meters away, Aphid was getting up, the servomotors in its legs revving wildly. The whole front side of Lui's ATLAS had been bashed in, the charred ballistic shield welded to its chest. Must be cramped as hell in the cockpit. The right leg was dented all around the knee area, but the mech was able to walk.

  The gunfire shifted away from squad one, toward Aphid instead.

  Go Lui! I sent his Implant. I probably wasn't the only one sending him messages of encouragement right about now.

  The gatling gun on the mech's right hand locked into place, and Lui aimed it at the men coming down the closest escarpment and fired.

  The roar of the gatling filled the air. Lui immediately stopped taking gunfire from the closest slope of the defile. He rammed his left fist into the ground, breaking off the useless remnants of the ballistic shield, then he swiveled the second gatling into place on his left arm and aimed it up the other slope.

  Each gat was capable of firing one hundred rounds per second, or 6,000 per minute. The fire rate was so incredibly fast that it was like a thread of light connected the gats to their distant target, a thread that alternately dimmed and brightened at various points along its path. Those bullets almost seemed to be traveling in reverse, away from the target: the effect was similar to a hub cap spinning at high speeds and seeming to rotate backward.

  Anyway, the enemy positions were positively battered.

  I hadn't been paying much attention to the comm chatter up until this point, but I tuned in now.

  "I want that mech covered!" Chief Bourbonjack was saying.

  Liu raced Aphid up the nearest slope.

  I turned my rifle toward the top of the defile and started taking out fleeing SKs, keeping one eye open as I shot so as not to diminish my battlefield awareness.

  A rocket fired down at Lui.

  Lui darted sideways and launched the "Trench Coat" countermeasure: seventeen pieces of metal flew toward the rocket. Incredibly, the rocket got through. Lui spiraled his body as the rocket came in, and the missile tore by just in front of his torso, exploding further down the slope.

  Unscathed, Lui landed, then clambered the final steps to the top of the leftmost peak. Red dots instantly appeared on my map around his position as men in SK jumpsuits were identified. Liu swept his massive arm to the left and right, swatting them from the escarpment like bugs. As fast as those red dots appeared they vanished.

  I was scanning those slopes, looking for the rocket operators. I was distracted by the sound of several rockets firing, and when I swung my scope toward Lui I saw that he'd swapped out one of the gatlings for a rocket tube and was unleashing a barrage of serpents at the peak on the opposite side of the defile. The deadly payloads took out good chunks of the slope. Rock shards and SK body parts rained down. More red dots appeared and vanished.

  Aphid leaped across the defile to the opposite peak. That action flushed fifty SKs down the escarpment, conveniently outlined in red on my Implant. Those men scrambled over and down the rockface toward my position.

  Lui didn't dare unload his gatling at the fleeing men—we'd be caught in the crossfire.

  But Lui didn't have to do the killing now.

  We were perfectly capable.

  I peered into my sniper scope and picked off SKs one after another. I was like a killing machine. Cold-hearted, relentless. Shaw had been right about me after all.

  I was a killer.

  But right now all that mattered was that I kill, or be killed.

  Alejandro, the other sniper in squad one, was firing almost constantly, as were Big Dog, Bender and Facehopper with their M4s. Snakeoil was using up the last of his own M60 ammo.

  I decided I wanted to do some more damage.

  I lowered my sniper rifle and slid the strap of the Carl Gustav off. I loaded a round, mounted the Gustav against my shoulder, held the grips near the front, aimed through the optical sight, and fir
ed from my prone position. Where it struck thirty meters above me, a huge chunk of rock fell away from the slope. The fragments from the warhead took down five SKs.

  On autopilot, my body automatically slid the hinged breech aside to reload the Gustav. I popped in the second round, and fired. Another huge chunk of rock fell away. That was my last round so I had to toss the Gustav away.

  I grabbed my rifle and started picking off men again.

  The SKs continued to run into our meat grinder. They didn't have a choice, not with Lui behind them in Aphid.

  For a second I thought we might actually win this.

  For a second I thought the tide of battle was shifting our way.

  That we were invincible after all.

  But then three more rockets streamed toward Lui's position from the opposite slope. He'd missed a group of enemies.

  Actually no, that wasn't true. I was the one had missed that group of enemies. I should have taken them down. I should have kept scanning that opposite slope. But I'd been too tempted by the easy targets.

  And now Lui would pay.

  Lui launched his "Trench Coat" again. One of the three rockets went down.

  Lui tried to jump, but it was too late—

  Aphid took the full brunt of the two remaining rockets. I saw the mech fly forwards then roll down the hill.

  It was a long, painful roll.

  Lui's mech tumbled past the fleeing SKs, then continued another twenty meters, finally coming to a stop at the bottom of the defile.

  Alejandro and I rushed forward to help him. We weren't going to abandon our brother there, on the slope. No MOTH ever left another MOTH behind.

  The mech was a crumpled wreck, and I knew right away that it wasn't going to get up again. Not this time. As for Lui, his vitals were still being transmitted, but they were weak.

  The hail of gunfire resumed, pinning Alejandro and I behind Aphid.

  I heard Chief Bourbonjack on the comm now. Troop level. "We don't have a few minutes! I need a CASEVAC immediately! And where's my QRF? Goddamn it!"

  "Just took out two of the rocketeers," Ghost said on the comm. "No sign of the third."

  I wasn't sure that meant anything. Take out a rocketeer, and someone else would just pick up the rocket launcher.

  Lui managed to pull the manual release inside Aphid, and the cockpit opened up. Thankfully the mech was facing away from the enemy, and the open cockpit provided us additional cover.

  Alejandro and I hauled Lui out. Gunfire whipped past on all sides, beyond the ATLAS.

  Lui was shaken, but alive. I couldn't see any bulletholes in his jumpsuit, or signs of blood, but it was possible he was suffering from crush injuries beneath the suit. That was something I couldn't treat out here. We'd have to get him to the Weavers on the Royal Fortune.

  Lui shook his head, apparently trying to clear it. "What happened?"

  "Can you walk?"

  He nodded.

  As the rest of squad one lay down suppressive fire, we hurried Lui to Manic's disabled mech and took cover. The SKs were coming down both slopes again, reattempting their flanking maneuver.

  "Guys, I want you to fall back to our position!" Chief Bourbonjack said on the comm line.

  "Roger that, Chief," Facehopper said. He looked at us. "Well, you heard the man. Two at a time. Go!"

  Big Dog and Bender went first, while the rest of us lay down suppressive fire. I hurled a few grenades.

  Facehopper and Manic went next.

  Then finally Snakeoil and a limping Lui.

  That left me and Alejandro.

  I hurled the rest of my grenade loadout and without waiting for them to explode I took off with Alejandro across the open ground.

  Gunfire rained down all around us. It didn't stop, not even when my grenades went off.

  Alejandro was ahead of me, and I saw a burst of steam erupt from one of his jetpack fuel canisters. It had taken a bullet. The contents quickly steamed out, leaving behind a charred puncture hole.

  Somehow Alejandro and I made it to the waist-high boulder where the rest of the platoon sheltered without getting shot. I took cover behind the crowded rock and aimed my rifle out along the rightmost flank. The SKs had started to flow onto the plateau now, and some of them were already taking cover behind Aphid, Lui's mech.

  It must have been about twenty minutes into the gunfight by now. I was picking off the SKs as fast as I could. I just kept firing and reloading, firing and reloading. I was glad I'd taken along so many magazines now, despite all the teasing. The barrel of my rifle was burning hot. My ears were just throbbing from the sounds of gunfire. Around me, the heavy gunners had all run out of ammo, and had switched to rifles or pistols.

  I glanced quickly at the health indicators on my HUD. As corpsman, it was my job to make sure everyone was all right. Everyone seemed fine. No, wait. The green bar representing Bender's vitals was dim, with a hint of red in it.

  I glanced at him.

  Bender was slumped up against the boulder, firing his M4 rifle at the left flank.

  "Bender is your suit compromised? Are you—"

  Bender's attention never left the enemy. "Don't move, caterpillar. Blood sealed the puncture. My suit's fine."

  I leaned back to get a better look at him. I could see red steam erupting from his jumpsuit, near the small of his back beneath the jetpack. The steam pulsed from the bullet-hole, probably in time to his heartbeat. His insides in the immediate area had obviously been pulled toward the puncture, sealing the outlying area and preventing suit decompression. But he was at serious risk of bleeding to death.

  I made my way over to him.

  "I said my suit's fine!" Bender hissed when he saw my approach.

  "Your suit's not fine, and neither are you." I reached for my medbag.

  "No," Bender grabbed the wrist of my jumpsuit, rather forcefully. "Shit. If you're going to do this, use my suitrep kit, man. Patch my suit. There's no time for anything else."

  I stared into his eyes and saw the determination there.

  "Caterpillar," he said, almost pleading. "I can hold till we reach the MDV. Come on!"

  I nodded. "Okay."

  I fetched his suitrep kit from the pouch in his leg, and I patched the back of his suit while he continued firing his M4.

  "Now get back to your position," Bender said. "We need your rifle."

  I had sealed the breach in his suit, but that wouldn't help with his actual wound. He'd bleed out unless we got that looked after soon.

  "Go!" he said.

  I turned away.

  "And Rade." That was the first time he'd ever said my name.

  "What?"

  "Thanks, bro."

  I nodded slowly, then loaded a fresh magazine and returned to my place on the outer edge of the boulder, scanning the area through my scope.

  The SKs had taken cover positions behind both Lui's fallen mech, and Manic's now. Just then I saw an SK peer out from behind the closer mech. He held a rocket launcher over his shoulder.

  My HUD displayed four bars above his head. High threat level.

  Got you, bastard.

  I took him out.

  "Watch the flanks!" Facehopper said.

  I glanced at the far left side of the plateau. Then the right. Groups of SKs were creeping forward on either side. Again they were trying the outflanking maneuver.

  And they were succeeding.

  The rest of us started to take them out, but then rockets came in from the forward direction, from behind the mechs, and we were forced to go down. Shale erupted all around us, and the shockwaves of the explosions caused vibrations to run right through my torso. None of us got hurt during that barrage, as far as I could tell. The whole point of the rockets was to allow the two groups on the far left and right sides to move forward unmolested.

  "Squad one fall back!" Chief Bourbonjack said. "Rally at the edge of the plateau. Move move move!"

  As Chief Bourbonjack and the rest of squad two laid down suppressive fire, the
members of squad one raced along the open ground toward the edge of the plateau. I heard the belt-whip sound of near-miss gunfire. Shards of rock burst into the air around me. I fired off a few random, unaimed shots into the SKs on my rear flank.

  Ahead of me, other members of the platoon were using quick horizontal bursts of their jumpjets to increase their speed. I did the same, careful to thrust only horizontally—remember, an airborne soldier in a situation like this was a dead soldier. It was a tricky business, firing off the jets over rocky terrain and not losing my footing, but I managed to get in two good spurts. On the third spurt I actually tripped, and ended up diving over the edge of the plateau and onto the downslope beyond.

  Facehopper was already in position to provide covering fire beyond the lip, with a few other members of squad one arrayed behind him. My momentum carried me over him and the others, toward the edge, and I slipped right off the escarpment. I saw someone's hand reach out to grab me, but it was too late.

  I slid down the slope. Fast. It must have been at least a seventy degree angle.

  I tried firing my jumpjets, but a bunch of shale had jammed-up the nozzle. I clawed at the rock, but I couldn't get a grip. Nothing worked. The shale was chewing up my jumpsuit. I expected to lose suit integrity any second.

  Miraculously, my suit remained intact, and somehow I managed to check my momentum. I'd ended up sliding about thirty meters—halfway down the slope.

  I spun around, lying flat, breathing hard, and I aimed my rifle upward. The sound of gunfire had been swapped out for the staccato of my beating heart.

  I tried activating my jumpjets again to get back to my squad.

  Still jammed.

  I was about to call for help when I heard a transmission from the Chief on the platoon line.

  "Squad two, fall back!"

  I wasn't going to call for help now: Squad one needed all the rifles it had, to cover squad two. Besides, I was safe. For now.

  Some moments later:

  "You see Mr. Galaal down there? He's got the right idea! Take cover on the hillside!"

  And so my teammates slid down the shale, using their jetpacks to control the slide, stopping at various points around me and taking shelter along the side of that steep escarpment. We all aimed our weapons at the plateau above, waiting for the inevitable appearance of the enemy. Alejandro was the closest, about three meters away on my right.