Project Sail

by Anthony DeCosmo

  He saw a few long clouds drifting slowly until disturbed by G-Moon’s latest invaders. Three objects streaked overhead, dragging fiery contrails in their wake.

  “They’re coming down on top of us!” Dr. King exclaimed over the proximity radio.

  “No, they are going to impact…hang on,” Kelly tracked the intruders on her computer that relayed information on both the screen and direct to her thinker chip. “About three kilometers west of our position…”

  …”This is Captain Charles of the SE 185 calling EA heavy cruiser, Captain Roussin, please respond.”

  The transmission filtered through a translator. A moment later, the two ships established a video link.

  Roussin wore a dark blue tunic and stood on a square bridge surrounded by crewman wearing full-face helmets that served as workstations. He was a tall man in his late middle ages with curled brown hair and a dreadlock beard, a symbol of status in the courts of Europe.

  He spoke and the computer translated French to English.

  “Captain Charles, congratulations on carrying out your mission. We will require a briefing on what your research teams have found on the moon.”

  “I need immediate transport to the surface, please send a shuttle. In the meantime, destroy this ship should it try to leave orbit. Also, there is a small group of Americans on the moon.”

  Roussin replied, “We have marked their location and have sent a combat team to secure the area.”

  “Captain, anyone already on the surface should be considered hostile and dealt with accordingly…”

  ...The three pods impacted the surface of G-Moon at the center of a wide basin surrounded by forests and rocky knolls, save for one clear exit leading toward a landscape of rolling hills.

  When they hit, sharp points sticking from the undercarriages fixed the pods in an upright position, their black skins contrasting with the green grass, gray trees, and brown rocks.

  For several minutes they remained motionless, dead meteorites that had landed in formation. And then their systems activated.

  What appeared to be pods were really shells. The center third rotated until revealing a thin red eye. Protective panels fell off freeing tubes and barrels, and two thick planks extended from the main frame to form hydraulic legs.

  With a hiss, a clang, whirring gears, and the buzz of building power, the pods morphed into walking metal pillars dressed in black armor, standing thirty meters, and programmed to kill.

  43. Goliaths

  “We should run and hide,” Dr. King offered her solution as she huddled with the ground team inside the base camp cave.

  Kelly Thomas stared into space as if in a daze, but she was watching video feed through her implant from Moe as the flying robot reconnoitered the European position.

  She told them, “I count three tall-skinnies and it looks like human and automaton troops disembarking from a heavy lifter.”

  “What is a tall-skinny?” King asked.

  Stein answered, “Goliaths. Are they moving?”

  “No, they’re establishing a security perimeter around the landing zone with local air patrols.”

  Hawthorne said, “They will set up a base and then come for us. I guess UVI and navy intelligence did not cut off Charles’ communications.”

  “We should run and hide,” King repeated.

  Hawthorne said, “The oxygen in our tanks will run out and even if we can breathe the atmosphere, we have three days’ worth of supplies.”

  Stein asked, “What do these Europeans want?”

  “They want this moon,” Hawthorne figured, “and that means killing us so no one can challenge their claim. Christ, I knew I shouldn’t have come on this mission!”

  Stein said, “So any second now a nuke or KI will blast us.”

  Hawthorne guessed, “No, they will want our data and they won’t want to do any ecological damage. They will send in combat drones to flush as out.”

  “So surrender!” King insisted.

  Stein told her, “They will kill us. We have no value to them; we are in the way.”

  Hawthorne paced, tapped his thigh, and flexed his fists. He saw no way out of this mess. They could not withstand an EA onslaught, their spaceship was no match for a heavy cruiser, and even if SE 185 could escape, the Alliance would blow them from the sky before they could reach orbit.

  Running and hiding would result in a slow death, standing and fighting a fast one, and surrender a quick execution. Stein was right; they were of no value to the EA.

  “Come on, you are the war hero,” King panicked and snapped, “think of something!”

  “A sneak attack?” Kelly suggested.

  “Against Goliaths?” Stein said. “Lieutenant, I may not be the military mind here, but I know that if a Goliath wants you dead, you are dead.”

  Hawthorne stopped pacing, stopped tapping, and stopped flexing his fingers.

  “Then we make them not want to kill us.”

  Stein asked, “And exactly how do we do that?”

  Hawthorne told them, “By now they know we have an alien artifact down here. Maybe it can be our lifeline.”

  Stein asked, “And this helps us how?”

  “They guarantee us safe passage off-world, or we blow it up.”

  ---

  Hawthorne stood outside the cave and eyed the terrain. Behind him to the north was a plateau where the space plane and one capsule sat parked, beyond that stretched a forest of trees with thick gray trunks. As the dim light of Gliese took to the blue-gray sky, green and yellow flowers bloomed in the branches. He wondered how they smelled.

  In front of him, the hill descended another five feet and then flattened out in a green plain. That plain extended south one hundred meters until another hill—this one steeper and rockier—formed the opposite wall of the shallow valley.

  To his left—the east—rolling grass-covered hills and then the cavern with the cylinder, a kilometer away.

  To his right—the west—the plain and soft hills continued until eventually reaching the European Alliance’s camp.

  Stein exited the cave with a backpack over his pumpkin suit and said, “I downloaded the data and wiped the drives.”

  “Good, give it to Dr. King for safekeeping.”

  They descended the slope and gathered by the walking storage container, which Kelly interfaced with through the wrist computer built into her suit sleeve.

  “Here,” she threw him an aerosol container, “get painted.”

  Hawthorne sprayed a cloud of sparkling gray mist over his suit and then did the same to Stein who asked, “What is this shit?”

  Kelly answered, “Chaff aerosol that will inhibit electronic tracking and help mask your heat signature.”

  “I feel better already,” Stein quipped.

  Kelly gave each of them a sleek carbine equipped with two targeting sites, a sling, and extra magazines.

  Dr. King refused, saying, “I do not know how to use a gun. Now, what is this walking cargo container?”

  Hawthorne answered, “The navy calls it an ‘army in a box’ and Henderson snuck it onboard without Charles knowing. The alliance will not expect this level of resistance, so it should buy time for Stein to plant the explosives.”

  “Why me?”

  “No thinker chip and with the shit you have done in your life, I bet you know how to rig a charge for remote detonation. Make sure you set up a transmitter that will work from orbit.”

  “You don’t have implants, either.”

  While true, Hawthorne knew he needed to be with Kelly, so he handed a satchel to the pilot and told him, “Take a hike.”

  “So if I understand this, I plant the charges and rig a remote detonator. You tell the alliance to let us fly away otherwise you blow it up?”

  “Yes.”

  King said, “You should contact the Alliance right now, before their machines get here.”

  Hawthorne explained, “We can’t tip our hand until the charges are in place. That means we will ha
ve to fight back their first wave to buy Bill time.”

  “Well then, I hope this works. Good luck,” Stein said, shook Hawthorne’s hand, and then started to the east.

  “So what else you got?” Hawthorne asked.

  Kelly detailed the contents: “Two AA/AS launchers with optical camouflage. Three self-propelled laser C-RAM units to set up a defense grid. Four T-UGS that I have already placed on our flanks, ten of the PDWs I just gave out, ten AP shrapnel grenades, and ten of the EMP variety, two more satchel charges, two high-powered sniper rifles, and this,” she directed their attention to the top of the container where a big gun popped up. Its barrel stretched six feet and was surrounded by tubes.

  “Coil gun,” she said.

  “That will leave a mark,” Hawthorne tried to sound funny but his voice shook too much to be taken as anything other than scared.

  Kelly retrieved a case and opened it, revealing individually wrapped syringes.

  “Combat stimulants, ten doses.”

  King protested, “Combat stimulates are unethical and dangerous.”

  Hawthorne replied, “They increase stamina and improve sensory acuity, plus a dose of liquid bravery, and I need that. But if you don’t like it, that’s fine, you are running off to hide in the woods, anyway. As for me, I will take my shot as soon as those Goliaths start moving.”

  King said, “Not much of an army; I was hoping you might have a regiment of grenadiers in there.”

  “Maybe these will do,” Kelly said and pushed a button on her forearm.

  Out marched four rows of six robots, each two feet tall walking on legs that also housed wheels. They were bipedal with tiny arms ending in pinchers, no heads but a lens protruded from their chests, a missile on each shoulder, and a barrel attached to their right arms.

  “Autonomous Combat Companions,” Hawthorne gave the formal name but Kelly called them “Little buddies.”

  “When Bill tells us the charges are in place, I will contact the Alliance and offer a deal. They would be crazy not to take it. We just need time.”

  Kelly placed a hand on her helmet as information came in from Moe.

  “That might be a problem.”

  ---

  Hawthorne grabbed the heavy, mustard-colored device by the handles, pushed a red button, and a metal prong drove into the soil, securing the portable anti-air/anti-surface emplacement to the hill north of the cave. He tapped another switch and a veil swung up and over the weapon, covering it in optical camouflage matching the grassy slope.

  A hundred yards away on the other side of the hollow, Kelly did the same with the second AA/AS and then radioed, “They are on the move and shooting at Moe!”

  As planned, she remained behind the ridge to the south and he stayed to the north.

  Hawthorne pulled the tab on a combat stimulant pack, extracted the syringe and plunged the needle into the medical port under his left arm. Two seconds later the suit’s injector transferred the drug from the port into his skin with a sharp prick.

  She radioed, “Two tall-skinnies inbound and some whirlybirds. Ground pounders and one Goliath are staying at base camp.”

  Hawthorne figured the EA sent the Goliaths and a few UAVs to handle what they saw as pest control, while the bulk of their invasion force established a long-term base.

  While it might have been his imagination, he thought he felt a tremble in the ground from the approaching machines. True or not, his stomach fluttered and he worried he might vomit. But as the stimulants took hold, his nerves smoothed and his stomach calmed. Fear remained, but beneath a layer of building adrenaline.

  He tapped the radio and transmitted, “Bill, what’s your status?”

  “I’ll be there in a minute or two.”

  As Stein finished speaking, the battle began.

  In flew eight spinning drones six feet long resembling the samara fruits that kids call helicopters when they flutter to the ground from Maple trees back on Earth.

  “The whirlybirds are priority,” Hawthorne radioed, knowing that denying the enemy reconnaissance capabilities would improve the odds of the plan’s success.

  In the distance, he spied two Goliaths, their black, monolithic profiles stood out against the green background, like a cancer growing on G-Moon’s surface.

  The hidden anti-air/anti-surface pods met the flying threat. Tiny missiles shot from either side of the hollow with thin streams of exhaust pushing them at subsonic speeds. Four hit, instantly shattering three of the flyers and splitting the fourth in two. The other four drones dropped counter measures and avoided the surprise strike.

  One whirlybird dove toward the innocent-looking storage container sitting silently on the grass.

  Hawthorne raised his rifle, aimed through the holographic sight, and released a seven-round burst, missing seven times. Yet the drone exploded as Moe swept in and fired his own cannon, sending smoking wreckage to the ground.

  However, two of the whirlybirds chased after Kelly’s airborne friend and they zigzagged off through the sky.

  The fourth EA flyer buzzed overhead and then disappeared to the east.

  Kelly came to Moe’s rescue with a high-powered sniper rifle. Her first shots missed the moving targets. Fortunately, the gun’s built-in radar locked on to a whirlybird and fired a precision-guided bullet, hitting what Kelly missed and downing the target.

  While the dogfight between Moe and one drone continued above, the Goliaths joined the fray. While still half-a-mile out, angled launch tubes extended from the top of their heads and Hawthorne heard the dull thwoop-thwoop of mortar fire.

  Despite the dose of liquid courage, Hawthorne wrapped his arms around his helmet.

  The trio of wheeled, C-RAM defenders placed in a loose triangle around the shallow valley responded with a web of lasers fired from spinning mirrored spheres. The incoming shells exploded overhead in clouds of black and gray like a boring fireworks show. With the task complete, the spheres stopped spinning and the C-RAMs automatically moved to new positions to avoid tracking.

  Hawthorne’s courage returned, although the stims deserved the credit.

  Kelly’s voice spoke in his ear: “Moe took another drone out, so there’s still one whirlybird out there. I will send our ‘little buddies’ to draw fire. They won’t last long.”

  Hawthorne answered, “Bill should be there by now!”

  The walking cargo container at the east end of the valley opened and the Autonomous Combat Companions marched out, first in rows and then forming a wedge formation as they moved toward the approaching Goliaths. At the same time, the coil gun deployed atop the container.

  More mortar fire came from the enemy, and again the defense grid rose to meet the challenge, destroying most of the shells; one hit in front of the infantry knocking three robots over, but they bounced right back up on their tiny mechanical feet.

  Hawthorne looked through the telescopic sight on his PDW at the Goliaths. Their mortar tubes had retracted but, as he watched, a compartment on each opened to reveal horizontal, revolver-like chambers underneath.

  He found a rock to cower behind while his army of robots walked forward like cows toward a hamburger mill.

  Those horizontal revolvers were electrically powered centrifuge weapons firing tungsten carbide rounds at the rate of one-hundred and twenty thousand per minute.

  Five little buddies instantly disappeared like popped metal balloons. He thought the others would be gone in three seconds, but the tough little robots changed their tactics.

  First, bolts of blue electricity erupted from the formation of small soldiers, befuddling targeting systems and deflecting bullets. Then the little buddies scattered faster than cockroaches caught in the kitchen light, rolling fast on their wheeled feet while shooting at the walking pillars.

  With air targets no longer a priority, the hidden AA/AS launchers targeted the Goliaths, launching miniature rockets. Two hit and did minor damage, the rest either fooled by electronic defenses or eliminated by the enemy’s laser
grid. The Goliaths then targeted and destroyed the launchers.

  What began as a neat and orderly engagement disintegrated into chaos.

  The centrifuge weapons fired, stopped and adjusted, and fired again, destroying more mini robots as they raced around the field shooting missiles from their shoulders.

  Curly—the rickety rover—came rolling in from the north striking at the Goliath’s left flank while the dog-like Larry bound in from the south, rockets blazing.

  Again, the Goliaths parried the projectiles with hundreds of narrow red laser beams. But with the little buddies and Kelly’s drones attacking simultaneously, it appeared to Hawthorne the enemy’s defenses teetered on collapse.

  The Goliaths showed his thinking to be wrong. The marching pillars targeting every opponent on the battlefield at once, firing three dozen missiles in one massive salvo.

  Despite protection from the C-RAM units, several little buddies blew apart, Curly was nearly knocked over by a near miss, and a rocket exploded above Larry’s head peppering the robot with shrapnel and forcing him to retreat.

  Hawthorne saw one projectile go for Kelly but her spray-on chaff disoriented the guidance system and it missed. Another warhead hit the ground ten yards in front of him, sending the Commander rolling down the hill.

  He radioed Stein again, “Bill, please tell me you rigged the charge!”

  No reply.

  Reasons he might not reply scrolled through Hawthorne’s thoughts: busy planting the explosive…disorientated from a cylinder emission…EA jamming communications…

  A sound like a gong slammed by an electric guitar grabbed Hawthorne’s attention and he saw the walking cargo container fire its coil gun. A football-sized projectile slammed into a Goliath dead center, destroying its centrifuge gun and blasting a big hole through which red sunlight shined.

  For a moment, Hawthorne hoped the coil gun might turn the tide, but a cloud of nanobots resembling a swarm of bees flew out from one Goliath and circled the hole in the damaged machine, repairing the wound.

  Still, this was a moment of opportunity and he hoped Kelly—who controlled their robotic army through her thinker chip—would seize it.