by Mars Dorian
“No,” Chikara shot back with zeal. “The humans cause enough trouble. They will not interfere.”
“Our soldier is—“
“The human must be quiet. Now.”
Tavio wished Hōshi was in charge. Despite the race’s telepathic communication ability and shared appearance, they didn’t share the same personality types. Chikara seemed impossible to convince. So his only choice was to stand idle and watch Chikara releasing a set of drones from a nearby cluster bay. They whizzed high above the valley and spread out to increase their data collection range. Tavio counted eight in total, combing the exoplanet’s sky and changing altitude. The captain wondered how she was able to control all units at the same time—either they functioned autonomously, or her brain was able to multitask. He watched the new footage updating on the inner panels of the dome. Close-up bird’s eye view of the jungle and canyon grounds played out on the screen. Tavio squeezed his eyes and spotted angular constructs peeking out the soil. Their extended cables tore through the alien ground like metal snakes. The strange structures released an onslaught of creatures which crept through the thicket in swarm formations. Hordes of crawlers swept through the jungle in an unrelenting force.
“Do they know where we are?”
“They seem to know the cluster’s approximate location.”
Which meant their holographic shield still hid the structure from prying eyes. The question was for how long?
Chikara seemed to be merged with her core terminal, but she still could easily speak to Tavio and the doctor. “Chikara will divert the Verge’s attention to allow more time for the cluster to prepare the countermeasures.”
So she prepared for a ground-based war.
“One cannot talk to the Verge at this stage.”
Dr. Eriksun winked at the captain and switched to a private peer-to-peer channel. “They have a long history with the Verge.”
“Chikara acts as if she had fought the Verge many times over. I wonder how much she’s keeping from us.”
“When the time is right, I will ask her.”
Tavio wanted to hug the doctor. She kept a cool head in the hottest of situations and always provided a peaceful solution. However, the gravity of the moment quickly evaporated his gratitude. The onslaught of crawlers spread through the jungle like an unstoppable infection. Chikara activated a facility dozens of kilometers away from the main cluster. A small, autonomous drone station rose from the ground.
“It is an autonomous surveillance relay,” she said over the comm, “to study the planet’s bio-diversity.”
She launched a flare signal which burst into the sky. Seconds later, a division of the Verge swarms aborted their jungle route and targeted the drone station. “Moths to the flame,” Tavio said absentmindedly.
Chikara diverted the enemy forces through decoy maneuvers, and for a while it seemed to work. But one formation of the Verge force cut straight through the jungle and marked the valley…
55
The dome panel turned into an immersive holo motion picture of the worst kind. It was like observing a terrible shipwreck—a disaster for sure, but also addicting to watch. Tavio’s eyes were glued to the hexagon-shaped panels which depicted the advance of the crawler swarm to the south. In a handful of minutes, they’d reach the valley.
Chikara must have realized the danger because she tried another decoy maneuver kilometers away, but it failed. The swarm division ignored every one of her distraction tactics and pursued their trajectory relentlessly. Somehow, the new life form must have known it was being tricked.
Then the inevitable happened.
A handful of the crawlers crossed the invisible barrier of the holographic shield and entered the valley of the cluster. The second their little optical sensors captured the structure, all units on the dome view screen—no matter how far located from each other—stopped in their tracks and changed gears.
Swarm-thinking, Tavio thought. These creatures are a goddamn beehive in cybernetic shells.
They were connected to each other and could share information at the speed of light. Which meant every other swarm division canceled their route and targeted the location of the cluster. Which meant Tavio and his crew waded through the deepest trouble of their life.
Chikara shook inside her terminal. “The Verge will stop at nothing to flood the Collective. The war continues.”
“Let us help you to—”
“The humans do not interfere in one’s matters.”
Tavio could swear yet another layer of armor whooshed over the gate. The cluster seemed to be the exterior representation of Chikara’s inner emotional world. If she closed up, so did the structure.
“Chikara will defend the cluster.”
The captain wished she was right, but the number of hostiles flooding the zone worried him. Tavio had to stand by and watch as wave after wave of cybernetic creatures stormed into the valley.
56
The defense entity unleashed her own cybernetic battalion. Four squadrons of aerial drones lifted from the cluster’s airpads and joined in V-formation. On the ground, six hovertanks spearheaded through the wall opening and rotated their double-barreled, directed-energy mounts. Behind the barrier, sturdy artillery walkers produced pods from their rear and drilled them into the ground to mitigate the recoil from their mighty barrels. They raised their ballistic-based cannons at a steep angle and seemed to target the incoming crawler flood. Within a matter of minutes, the armada was set up and ready to strike hard.
Tavio stood still with his mouth half open.
Chikara created a different attack plan for each unit type and launched her combined arms assault at the enemy swarm. The interceptor drones guarded the bombers on their drop route while the hovertanks spread out and welcomed the enemy swarm in formation. The stationary artillery units behind the wall fortified their long-range cannons, ready to fire. The spectacle resembled an Alliance recruit playing a VR strategy game in real-time. Tavio still couldn’t believe how the defense entity could handle so many units at once.
“I hate to bother you, but are you controlling all of them?”
“The human can not possibly disturb her. Chikara is accessing twenty-five percent of her mental workload.”
Impressive. So she was able to freely segment her brain power, which meant her race was fully cyborg. Tavio’s memory cell worked similarly, but he couldn’t possible steer an unmanned armada of that size. At least not alone.
Let’s see what you can do.
Tavio observed as the first salvos of the artillery units looped through the sky until they impacted the ground around the crawlers. Blue explosions swallowed dozens of units at once and spat out the broken debris. The Verge reacted by diverging their units from the impact zones. Instead of evenly flooding the valley, they zigzagged around the battlefield and increased the distance to each other to avoid getting taken out by a single load. Chikara wasn’t going to let them rest for a single second. Her bombers dropped their loads and flattened the land. Shockwaves wiped through the prairie and blew the cybernetic creatures to pieces. Wherever Tavio looked at the dome’s view screen, he saw the ground exploding and spitting up tons of debris.
So much for the peaceful race, he thought. But maybe the Collective resembled humanity after all. Curious and exploratory by nature; militaristic by necessity.
Chikara launched her armada and leveled the ground. But the Verge wouldn’t take the beating—another glance at the top left panel revealed their spawn carrier in space reacting to the situation. The giant structure launched squadrons of dagger-shaped vessels which pierced the atmosphere. They rained down the exoplanet’s sky and darted toward the cluster like predatory knives. Tavio gritted his teeth. He wished he knew how to control the terminal, because he would have changed tactics immediately. Since the captain was reduced to the role of passive bystander, all he could do was watch and lament. “Chikara, you have to watch out for your bombers and take out the mobile factories to stop their back
up.”
“The human does not tell her what to do.”
When under fire, Chikara’s ego flamed like a chemical thruster. Still, she changed tactics. A division of her aerial interceptors aborted their escort and intercepted the incoming Verge fighters.
“See?”
On the ground, the hovertank charged their directed-energy beams and vaporized the creature shells. The particles floated into the air and illuminated the semi-transparent beam as it tore through the distance. The Verge swarm vaporized under the constant fire.
Chikara set up a stellar defense, but the Verge kept on going—creature wave after creature wave.
Hit the mobile factories, Tavio thought, hoping that his mental message somehow reached the stubborn defense entity in the terminal. A division of the bomber drones whooshed over the jungle and bombarded the mobile factories into blue oblivion. Tavio fired up his right arm and shouted, “That’s how you do it.”
And yet, the hostile life form remained relentless.
Half of the mobile factories survived the bombardment and adapted to the situation. They produced a new unit type that launched anti-air projectiles. The high velocity javelins speared through the sky. A handful of bombers spiraled down and crashed into the greens of the jungle.
The Verge is capable of a self-replicating army, Tavio thought. And they kept changing their approach. When Chikara launched bombers, the Verge used organic FLAK. When Chikara advanced her hovertank squadron, the Verge countered with small crawler units that swarmed out and assaulted the floating vessels like hyper-aggressive insects, jump-attacking the hulls and ripping them apart with their claws. The hostile life form combined an endless array of self-replicating units and swarm methodology to dominate the battle. A heavy squad of crawlers breached the first line of defense and attacked the now defenseless artillery units. Which meant they lurked only a few hundred meters away from the exterior hull of the cluster.
Couldn’t be
Wasn’t supposed to be
But it did happen.
Tavio swallowed down the shock and anchored his power stance. Chikara’s defense was admirable, but she needed help, now more than ever.
“Our dropship is filled with arms. Let us be the last line of defense.”
Tavio braced himself for another act of aggression from her, but the creature lost her edge. “The humans want to sacrifice themselves?”
“We want to survive like you.”
Chikara towered inside her terminal and didn’t speak a word, but the locks of the dome gate deactivated while the iris shutter parted. The way to the lower corridors opened up. It was the closest thing to a ‘yes’ Tavio could hope to get.
“Thank you,” he said and caught the doctor’s glimpse.
“What’s the plan, sir?”
“You stay here and update me on the Verge’s progress. I’ll get Bellrog in case the crawlers breach the last defense perimeter.”
She narrowed her slim eyes. “You’re seriously trying to stop that monster army? Haven’t you seen the mayhem it has unleashed?”
“We have very capable weapons, Doctor.”
She wouldn’t let him off the hook. “You mean your ion pistols and flechette rifles?”
“I mean mobile WMDs.”
Eriksun’s jaw dropped. Tavio used the cue to dash off and escape the dome. Now wasn’t the time to talk ethics and weapon treaties. A relentless organism drilled itself through the cluster and needed to be stopped at all costs.
57//Chamber cell
Bellrog experienced an emotion so rare, it took him two full seconds to voice it.
Utter confusion.
The soldier watched Hōshi dancing around the chamber while flailing her main slender arms. But this wasn’t her happy-go-lucky dance; this looked like a manic the-world’s-gonna-end seizure. The only thing Bellrog could say was an ancient medic command from the frontlines of the war. “Hōshi, state the case of your emergency.”
“It is here. Here, here.”
Nothing was ‘here’ except for him and the Yuugen unit, but then again, Hōshi was tuned into the mind network of her entire race. The soldier grabbed her arm but ensured he didn’t squeeze tight. “Tell me what’s going on.”
He toned down. “Let me help you.”
Hōshi stopped yanking around and concentrated her coal eyes. “The Verge is here.”
“Verge?”
“It is approaching the cluster with its armada. Infiltration is imminent. Execution likely.”
“What is the Verge? A hostile aggressor?”
He aimed at the ceiling although he knew the Yuugen’s version of the PA seemed to emanate from every wall. “Whoever’s in charge, you gotta do something.”
He pointed at Hōshi’s seizures as if to hammer home the point. “She’s spasming out. Get a damn medic.”
Instead of the medical support, a far more familiar figure bolted around the floor and stopped in front of the force field, which fizzled out with a snap.
“Sir?”
Captain Alterra bent over and supported his arms on his thighs while grasping for the air in his helmet. He looked like he must have ran a marathon—twice. “Armor up, soldier. We’re getting a visit.”
“You mean the Verge?”
“How do you—?”
“Long story. What’s the plan?”
“The Collective is allowing us to go back to our dropship in the hangar. We can finally get our firearms.”
The statement sounded so surreal Bellrog had to gauge the captain’s face shield to make sure his ears weren’t broken. “They are allowing us to armor up?”
“The situation is desperate, Sergeant. That Verge lifeform has decimated the cluster’s defenses and is about to break through the last line of protection.”
It sounded horrendous and exhilarating. Bellrog needed to engage and use his rusty body. Close quarters combat was the reason he was bred. It was the reason why his heart pumped with passion now. He pointed at Hōshi. “What about her?”
“Later. We have to survive this first.”
Bellrog eyed the creature as she remained standing in the middle of the chamber. She kept quiet but had stopped twitching. For some reason, Bellrog felt the urge to wave back at her. “Let me kick the Verge’s ass before we continue our conversation.”
“She waits for him.”
Bellrog focused on the captain. “Let’s get cranking, sir.”
The two hurried along the moving ground. Way markers updated on their augmented vision and showed the route back to the upper hangar platform. The lift’s iris shutter retracted and welcomed their human visitors in before the capsule levitated through its inner rings.
The short time out allowed Tavio to recover from his sprint. “You seem to have built quite the interspecies relationship during my absence.”
“No big deal. The Yuugen are fascinated by our history. Makes talking easy.”
“Yuu-gen?”
“Oh, yeah, that’s apparently what these creatures call themselves. The name’s based on some Terran existentialism stuffed with self-pity and star pain. Woo-hoo, brain dust, but that’s how they roll.”
“She told you that?”
“Hōshi told me plenty—how she contacted us, her race’s thoughts of humanity, and why she went against their collective will.”
He paused.
“Heh, she just wouldn’t stop comlinking me.”
The captain seemed flabbergasted. “Did you… use physical force?”
It was a strange accusation. Not too long ago, Bellrog would have indeed considered taking Hōshi hostage. Now that same thought sounded foreign and even bewildering. Could a man’s mindset change that fast? After all, the Fairstryke credo was to adapt at all times.
“I guess I was just curious. There’s something fascinating about these pale stick figures. Isn’t it human to learn more about the unknown?”
Bellrog counted as a synthetic cloned from human cells. The soldier wanted to believe that he himsel
f developed curiosity, and not some science team in a Fairstryke lab. After all, no synthetic had ever experienced the wonder of treading on an exoplanet and connecting with a biomorph. This epiphany would distinguish himself from any synthetic unit in the Fairstryke force.
“Let’s philosophize later, Sergeant,” the captain said as the lift’s doors revealed the access to the hangar.
58//Yuugen Cluster, hangar
Tavio and his ground-pounder dashed toward the shuttle that remained parked at the same spot. He also noticed fewer Yuugen vessels standing around—maybe Chikara had launched them to deal with the new crisis.
“Let’s use whatever we have at our disposal.”
“Lootin’ the treasure chest.”
Bellrog approached the dropship’s cargo bay and assembled the weapon’s chests. Another DNA-swipe and the arms treasure shone in its metal-glinted glory.
“What type of invader are we talking about?”
Tavio exchanged the dome panel footage taken with his helmet’s cameras. He fast-forwarded to the moment where the Verge carrier had launched its ground force. Even iceberg Bellrog sweated at the sight. “It’s a swarm-based force. Since I don’t know anything about how their weaponry functions, we have to go all-round.” He fanned out the cascade of weapons. “These beasts are cybernetic organisms, so we’ll take EMP grenades. We’re also in close-combat, so scatterguns with bouncer shells are a must. The shots will ricochet off the walls and cause spread damage.”
Tavio soaked up the weapons display and eyed a smaller gun with the shape of an electrical razor blade. “What’s that?”
“PEPS gun. Non-lethal stunner against humans, useless against what we’re facing here.”