Mecha Corps

by Brett Patton

  Matt stepped in front of the guard. He couldn’t let the kid go. That jump might be a one-way death trip into outer space, or a fiery plunge into Earth’s atmosphere.

  The guard hit him like a hammer. Their helmets impacted with a resounding crack, and Matt’s feet came off the ground. The young man grabbed desperately at Matt as they tumbled over the surface of the UUS Mercury, slowly gaining altitude. Blue Earth and gray asteroid wheeled in Matt’s POV.

  If the kid was frightened before, he was terrified now. His lips skimmed back over chattering teeth. Beads of sweat stood out on his forehead. He yelled at Matt, spittle spraying on his faceplate.

  Matt cursed. It wasn’t his problem if the kid didn’t know how to use comms. Talking was pointless anyway. Their trajectory would take them close to the top of the bridge. With any luck, they’d hit it. That impact would sap their momentum and they’d fall back down to the surface.

  It would be close. The bridge swelled in front of them. Inside, a crew member looked up from her screen, her mouth agape in surprise.

  Matt stretched hard, but his fingers only brushed the edge of the bridge as they passed over it. That didn’t do anything except make their tumbling worse.

  “Hey!” Matt’s comms crackled alive. The guard had finally found a clue.

  Matt looked down. They were about ten meters off the asteroid and still rising. That was bad. That meant they probably weren’t coming down.

  Matt turned on his comms. “What’ve you got to throw?”

  “What?” the kid’s voice was high and screechy.

  “Throw! Something to throw! To get us back down.”

  The kid shook his head. “I—I don’t get it.”

  Matt sighed. “This is microgravity. We have to slow down, or we’re going on a long trip in a space-suit spaceship.” Matt felt along his own suit, hoping the digger had left an anchor. There was nothing. “We need to throw something in the direction we’re going, or we aren’t going to come down. Heavy things. Got anything heavy?”

  The kid shook his head. “I—Uh, I don’t know.”

  Matt groaned. They didn’t have time for this. He pulled the stun stick off the guard’s utility belt.

  “Hey! You’re under arrest!” the kid grabbed for the club.

  “Let’s save ourselves now and talk about that later.”

  The kid looked doubtful while Matt weighed the stick in his hand. It was heavy, but not nearly heavy enough to make a difference in the velocity of a 150-kilo mass. Unless he could launch it fast enough.

  “Give me your belt,” Matt said.

  “Why?”

  “Because you don’t want to die.”

  The kid pulled off his belt. Matt looped it through the wrist strap of the nightstick and twirled it over his head, like a video of an ancient cowboy about to rope a steer. He’d have to release it at exactly the right moment. That would be tough. They were still tumbling over the asteroid’s rough surface.

  “Hold on,” he told the kid. “And don’t move.”

  Matt threw the nightstick. It rocketed out toward Earth, disappearing almost instantaneously into the brilliance of the clouds.

  He’d timed it well. They were falling slowly toward the surface of the UUS Mercury.

  The guard saw it. “How’d you know to do that?”

  “I learned a thing or two growing up on Displacement Drive ships.”

  The kid nodded. He looked down at the surface, now only a few feet below them. They passed over a deep pit where a Rhino-class Union warship crouched. Dark gray and angularly utilitarian, it was intended for close-range combat in deep space. Lights glowed dimly through tiny, slit windows, deep-set under thick armor. Long gouges in its sides spoke of recent combat. Matt wondered where they’d been fighting. Some frontier world too insignificant to make the news? Or perhaps near one of the fleets of independent Displacement Drive ships?

  It didn’t matter. Battleships were single-purpose machines, whether they were slow Rhinos or fast Cheetahs. The decisive victories, the ones people cared about these days, came on the ground, via Mecha. Mecha were the only things that could protect the tiny number of habitable worlds in the Union without the wholesale destruction of nuclear weaponry. Even the Corsairs weren’t insane enough to poison a valuable planet. Mecha were used when the fight mattered the most.

  Matt and the kid grazed a rocky outcropping, spraying dust and rock chips in glittering, sunlit plumes. Matt pinwheeled his arms to change their orientation and dug his heels into the ground. More dust ballooned up as he brought them to a stop.

  “You can let go of me now,” Matt said.

  The kid blushed and released him, taking two unsteady steps away. He grabbed for his Spazer gun at his belt. Of course, the gun and his belt were both gone.

  “I still, uh, have to arrest you,” he said.

  Matt shook his head but said nothing.

  “It’s dangerous, what you did. Against regulations.”

  Matt could tell the guard that he’d been safe, that he’d done it before. He could remind him that he’d still be on an unplanned tour of outer space if it weren’t for Matt. But all that didn’t matter.

  Only one thing mattered: Would this keep him out of training camp?

  The kid found an air lock and escorted Matt down the passenger corridors to the security center. His Velcro-soled shoes scritched on the fuzz of the floor. Happy passengers dressed in bright tourist colors passed them with curious glances, heading toward their vacations on historic Earth.

  The holo-posters in the hallways seemed to mock Matt. VISIT AMAZING WASHINGTON, DC, AND SEE THE FOUNDATION OF THE UNION CONSTITUTION one read, showing gleaming white marble buildings. ROME/ATHENS COMBO TOUR: SEE COLISEUMS, TEMPLES, CATACOMBS read another, which displayed fantastic ruins. DISCOVER ANCIENT CHINA: FORERUNNER OF TAIKONG LINGYO offered a third.

  The security center was a large room carved directly out of the raw gray rock of the asteroid. Stainless-steel desks stood in rows, manned by blue-uniformed staff. On the far wall, a giant holoscreen streamed hundreds of video feeds from inside the UUS Mercury: docks, corridors, restaurants, rec rooms, bridge and command centers, even feeds showing the stony surface outside. Yellow icons floated over some of the feeds, calling out minor problems like lock malfunctions and suspicious behavior.

  A large, red-faced man stomped up to meet them. He wore a blue uniform and an intricate badge that read UUS MERCURY SECURITY: LT A. HARPER.

  “What the hell you think you’re doing, kid?” Harper shouted at Matt. “Trying to get yerself killed? Trying to get Pete here killed?”

  “I’m sorry, sir,” Matt said. “I didn’t mean—”

  “You didn’t mean shit!” Harper bellowed. Everyone in the room turned to look at them. “We saw you bribing the digger—we got you on the vid! You knew what you were doing. And you meant to do it.”

  “Look, sir. I really didn’t want any trouble. I shouldn’t have been out there, and I’m sorry. It’s just, well . . . You see, sir, I’ve got to get down to Earth.”

  “Ha! Like hell you do!” Harper said. “Put Earth in your memory bank! You’ll be a digger the rest of your life right here on the ol’ Mercury!”

  Matt’s stomach flipped. His chance at being a Mecha cadet was flying away like a paper airplane in a zero-G hangar.

  “But . . .” Matt trailed off. What could he say? How could he justify it? NO EGRESS AT DISPLACEMENT. Simple as that. Stupid.

  “But what? What you gonna tell me I don’t already know?” Harper picked up a glowing slate. “Rich kid from Aurora U thinks the rules don’t apply. Well, money ain’t a get-outta-jail-free card!”

  “Sir, I’m not—” Matt’s anguish made his voice crack. “Look, I have to get down there! I’m going to training camp !”

  “I don’t care where you—,” Harper began, then stopped himself. “Wait. What did you say?”

  “I’m going to Mecha Training Camp.”

  Harper went beet red. “You’re a Mecha cadet?”r />
  “Yes, sir.”

  Harper glared at Matt, his expression shading to purple. “You got proof?”

  Matt nodded. He reached into his breast pocket and pulled out the laser-etched holographic invitation. Gasps erupted in the room around him. Pete leaned over Matt’s shoulder to gape at the gilded e-sheet signed by Kathlin Haal, the Union’s Prime.

  Harper snatched it out of his hands and ran it under a scanner. All color drained from his face as he read the screen.

  “You’re a goddamn Mecha cadet,” Harper grated low and rough.

  Matt nodded, afraid to say a single word. Was that good? Bad? Would Harper tear up his invitation and laugh at him? Would there be more penalties from the Mecha division itself?

  Harper thrust the invitation back at Matt. “Go.”

  Matt took the paper with numb fingers.

  Harper nodded. “Get on the shuttle.” Then he blew out a big breath, all his anger gone. “Go save the Union.”

  “Yes, sir!” Matt said.

  “Just don’t pull any dumb shit like you did here,” Harper called after him.

  Matt shook his head. No more dumb stunts. He smiled. He was a Mecha cadet, and the Universal Union needed him.

  2

  INDUCTION

  Matt’s invitation directed him down to UUS Mercury’s Auxiliary Shuttle Bay, where a small, delta-winged craft squatted. It bore both the Union’s concentric thirty-star insignia and the logo of Advanced Mechaforms: the shadow outline of a Mecha crouched to jump.

  The pilot was a young woman with short-cropped red hair. She wore a simple gray uniform with three silver stripes embroidered into the sleeve. On the front of the uniform was a single black bar reading L. STOLL.

  Stoll scanned Matt’s e-sheet invitation and nodded at the shuttle’s hatch. Matt started when he noticed that her eyes were a bright violet color. Violet eyes were a signature of genetic modification, and genemod was widely hated in the Universal Union. It was a holdover from the Human–HuMax war 150 years ago, when the genetically engineered “superhuman” HuMax laid siege to the richest human worlds. They’d almost won, too. Only the formation of the Universal Union and the eventual eradication of every living HuMax had ended it.

  She noticed his stare. “What is it, cadet candidate?”

  “I, uh, I don’t recognize your uniform,” Matt lied. “I was trying to place it.”

  “Mecha Corps Auxiliary,” she said. Her face was unreadable, her tone all business.

  “Gotcha,” Matt said. He tried not to steal a glance back at her as he slung his duffel bag over his shoulder. Most genemods wouldn’t openly display a hallmark like violet eyes in public. Was it just an Earth thing, or did it not matter in the Mecha Corps?

  “Where is other cadet?” bellowed a voice from deep within the shuttle. “I am not wanting to miss opportunity!”

  Matt jumped. Another cadet? He hadn’t expected that. He virtually flew through the hatch.

  In the cramped interior of the shuttle, a large man slouched on one of the four bare plastic seats. A loud, shiny shirt printed with floral patterns and a pair of white pants hung loose on this thick frame. Crow’s-feet wrinkles nestled in the corners of his eyes, and his bushy beard was shot through with gray. A huge pile of matching leather luggage covered the seat next to him and spilled into the walkway.

  “I not spent ten years struggling to miss cadet chance!” the man shouted, waving his invitation at Matt. “You see date and time? Sit in seat!”

  Matt sat down and buckled himself in. “I didn’t know there was another cadet on the ship.”

  The other man ignored him, his angry eyes fixing on Sergeant Stoll as she stepped in and pulled the hatch shut.

  “HuMax pilot, you go now! Time ticking!”

  Matt felt a quick stab of anger. She certainly wasn’t HuMax, and she’d probably had her share of taunts, insults, and outright beatings growing up.

  “Hey, did you choose your genes?” Matt said, struggling to keep his voice even.

  The other man’s eyebrows shot up in surprise. “I not genemod!”

  “She didn’t choose hers either. Her parents did. So why don’t you stop trying to piss off the pilot?”

  Out of the corner of his eye, Matt saw Sergeant Stoll turn to watch them. Her neutral expression didn’t change.

  “Oh, HuMax apologist, yes. They did not choose their genes either?” the bearded man said, coming off his seat, but the seat belt held him down.

  Matt clenched his fists, thinking of his father. His own stories. His own secrets. “HuMax chose what they did, and for that they are monsters.” His voice broke in anger.

  The bearded man twitched a quick little smile, apparently satisfied.

  “Some sense in you.” He looked up at Sergeant Stoll. “Freaky genemod pilot, please be going now.”

  Sergeant Stoll didn’t respond or change expression. She just ducked through the door to the cockpit and slid the folding partition shut.

  Moments later, the shuttle’s turbines spun up. Acceleration pushed Matt back in his seat. Through the small, thick window at his side, the raw stone of the UUS Mercury’s Auxiliary Shuttle Bay blurred past. Soon they were dropping toward Earth.

  The other man looked straight ahead, his arms crossed, his jaw set tightly. Matt sighed. Even if the guy was an asshole, he should introduce himself. Hell, he might end up fighting next to him.

  “I’m Matt Lowell,” Matt said, holding out his hand. “I didn’t expect anyone else from Aurora.”

  Silence for a while. Then: “Not from Aurora! Not rich boy with too much books!”

  Matt nodded. Displacement Drive ships couldn’t Displace any less than two light-years, or any more than twenty. That meant commercial ships had to hop from system to system in series, in a giant ring. This guy must have come from one of the worlds before Aurora.

  “Are you from Eastern?” Matt asked. “Or Purchase?”

  More silence. Finally, almost grudgingly: “Purchase. I am Serghey Anan.”

  “Good to meet you,” Matt said.

  “Now cease pretend interest, rich Aurora boy.”

  Matt sighed. Maybe wearing his blazer with the Aurora University crest wasn’t the brightest idea. But it was warm and comfortable. And growing up he’d learned never to let anything go to waste. Not clothes. Not even food. Refugee ships were rough places. Everybody worked, even when they were eight years old. Sometimes Matt’s job cleaning corridors didn’t pay enough to buy dinner. Sometimes he’d get to mess and find one of his digger friends had been sent to the doc because of a crappy pressure suit. Sometimes his friends just stopped showing up at all.

  What the hell does this jerk know? Sudden irritation boiled Matt’s blood. Rich or poor, life or death, nothing should be taken for granted.

  Matt forced his voice to be calm. “I’ll leave you alone.”

  “Bah,” Serghey said. He closed his eyes and made loud snoring noises.

  As the shuttle fell into the atmosphere, a high whistling filled the passenger compartment. Streamers of superheated orange air flickered outside the window as the air thickened.

  Florida swelled quickly as they dropped. Brilliant white clouds had moved in over the coast, covering Cape Canaveral, and the green Mecha lightning no longer flashed.

  When the shuttle finally descended below the clouds, the Cape lay just ahead. Green Florida grass and scrub alternated with mud-brown wetlands. Stubs of old, blocky buildings protruded from the greenery connected by broken blacktop roads. Just below them, a sprawling mass of concrete covered the land like a kilometers-wide spider. The center of the expanse was stained black-purple with multiple rocket burns, and the fading number 99 was etched at one side.

  Matt felt a sudden shock of recognition. Launch Facility 99. That was something they taught in human history. It was the first of the heavy launch facilities used by the United States after the discovery of the Displacement Drive. The First Expansion into space had started here, more than 250 years ago.

/>   Farther off, the Atlantic shimmered like polished aluminum under the bright, overcast sky. At the edge of the ocean, spindly structures rose from overgrown cement pads, mottled black and red. They had to be gantries. Leftovers from the first days of the Space Race.

  A shiver of pride passed through Matt, and he drew a deep breath. This was huge. Even though the United States was gone, as all nations were, its Constitution had formed the basis of the Universal Union’s Articles of Unity.

  But the farther they flew, the worse Cape Canaveral looked. Crumbling buildings overgrown with vines, blacktop slumped into sinkholes, rows of dust-streaked tents, trenches gouged in the Earth, rusted heaps of old cars—it looked like the setting for a postapocalyptic game. Matt turned to get a better look, but it flashed past too fast as they touched down. Matt couldn’t help wondering, This is Mecha Training Camp?

  When Sergeant Stoll opened the hatch, the heat and humidity hit Matt like a slap in the face. He gasped in the thick air. His Aurora University blazer was an oven, and sweat instantly coated his face.

  And there was the smell. Swamp rot over salt tang and seaweed, wet cement and the bloodlike scent of rust.

  “Propaganda about perfect Earth,” Sergey sneered, wiping his damp brow. Sweat had already stained the collar of his too-bright shirt. “All bullshit.”

  Matt nodded. Tourists liked to talk about how oddly “perfect” Earth was. The cradle of humanity! The best possible combination of gravity, weather, and environment! No other world came close! But to Matt, Earth was like the hydroponic gardens on the Rock, where sewage cooked by the solar concentrators fed the crops.

  Matt grabbed his bag. Serghey looked around unhappily. “Where is porter?” he cried, looking at his mountain of luggage.

  Sergeant Stoll ignored him and pointed across the runway to a group of people standing near the edge of the wetlands. “That’s where you need to be.” Her carefully neutral expression never changed.

  Matt nodded and hopped out of the shuttle, trying to avoid her eyes. Even though the sky was overcast, the ground gave off waves of heat. He took off his Aurora U jacket and carried it as he trudged across the runway.