XCOM 2

by Rick Barba

  As she swung the Vektor back and forth, seeking the target and vengeance, she heard a metallic zing directly above her head.

  * * *

  When Petrov woke, it was to oily darkness and a searing pain in her shoulders.

  Chamois cloth wrapped her eyes and mouth. Her arms and legs were trussed above her to a horizontal game-pole propped by two boulders. She hung, belly down. Her body weight stretched her sockets to near dislocation. She tried to cry out, but her mouth was packed tight.

  Most unsettling of all, she felt her midsection exposed. Her cloak, shirt, and leggings had been torn just enough to expose her abdomen from navel to sternum. She felt a chinook breeze on her skin there.

  A voice above her spoke, so impossibly deep it sounded synthesized.

  “I’d planned to gut you alive, like I did some of your brethren,” it said casually. “But now, I think not.”

  Petrov felt herself rising as the pole was lifted. Her body was set on the ground, gently, belly down, relieving the burning in her shoulders. Then she felt the game-pole slide down her back as it was pulled free.

  “I don’t begrudge your kills,” said the voice calmly. She felt its deep vibrato in her stomach. “My troops are little more than failed experiments.”

  Something massive clamped onto her forearm, and she felt her wrist bonds cut free. The vice grip yanked her to a sitting position as if she were a rag doll. Then her ankle bonds were sliced too.

  Now the voice was close to her ear.

  “Every Reaper will die, gutted,” it said. “In the meantime, enjoy your meals.”

  Petrov listened as slow, heavy footsteps padded away from her. Wildly, she clawed at the cloth knotted behind her head. When the chamois finally tore free, she saw a crescent moon directly above Shadow Canyon in the slate sky. She’d been unconscious for hours.

  Across the creek, a monstrous silhouette glided through a dark stand of pygmy pines. It flung something upward with the same metallic zing she’d heard before. A hundred feet up, sparks spit off the cliff face.

  Then the great fluttering shadow rose straight up the canyon wall and disappeared.

  DAROX GINGERLY TOUCHED the spot where they’d punctured his skull and torn out the implant.

  Crosshatched with metal sutures, the crude incision over the occipital bone was still numb and oozing orange blood. He dabbed hemp oil on the swollen seam in his scalp, as instructed. He’d been fully conscious during the procedure.

  Now he sat cross-legged on a woven mat in his hut, exploring the neural flow of unobstructed thought across his prefrontal cortex. He’d been meditating for two hours since the extraction. The Skirmisher celebration rite would begin shortly.

  Outside, someone shook the hut’s front flap.

  “Come in,” called Darox.

  The flap folded inward and a tall, broad figure clad in onyx body armor ducked into the room. “Are you well?” he asked.

  Darox nodded. They gazed at each other with large, silvery, pupilless eyes.

  The other, named Mahnk, smiled slightly and asked, “Do you feel different?”

  “Yes,” said Darox. He hesitated. “Well. Somewhat.”

  They said the surgery would change him, and he did feel changed. But he expected more—a surge of emotion, perhaps, or revelation. He glanced over at the gray alloy chest plate hanging on his wall hook. Something about it seemed altered. Nothing was really different, not objectively. But he seemed to see it anew. It was odd. He watched Mahnk wrinkle the nasal slits of his flattened, snakelike nose.

  “Can you smell the feast?” asked Mahnk.

  “I can,” replied Darox.

  “Are you hungry?”

  “No.”

  Mahnk sat on a low stool. “Did it hurt?”

  “Some.”

  Mahnk’s own extraction was scheduled for the following day. He nodded solemnly. “I do not mind pain when it’s unexpected or sudden, such as in combat.” He leaned forward, elbows resting on his knees. “But to sit in a chair and let someone drill into . . .” He stopped, looking up. His alien eyes darkened to a leaden gray. “While awake!”

  Darox was amused. “When the chip is finally out . . . you know, they showed it to me,” he said.

  Mahnk frowned. “Your extraction?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good god.”

  Darox nodded. “Trust me, when you see it, any pain you feel will become irrelevant.”

  For years—from his murky “birth” until just two hours ago—Darox’s occipital lobe had hosted a wireless neurochip. This chip received instructions transmitted psionically from a central ADVENT command center. These transmissions translated directly and instantaneously into both cognition and biomechanical impulses.

  Nobody knew the location of the source, the so-called ADVENT Network Tower; some skeptics even suggested it was a propagandistic myth. But Darox did not doubt its existence. He had felt its centrality. He had seen troopers in coordinated maneuvers, given no verbal or visual commands, yet moving in perfect sync with his own irresistible and unconscious urges.

  Darox could see that Mahnk was uneasy, so he said, “Tomorrow will be a good day for you, brother. Trust me.”

  “What does it look like?” asked Mahnk.

  “The chip?”

  “Yes!”

  Darox shook his head. “I cannot tell you,” he replied.

  “Yes, you can,” urged Mahnk.

  “It would spoil the surprise.”

  Mahnk grunted and widened his eyes.

  Amused again, Darox raised his thick brow. A cold chinook gust rattled the hut. They both looked up as the nanofiber ceiling undulated.

  “Winter is coming,” said Mahnk.

  Darox nodded. “That means fewer alien patrols,” he said. “Fewer convoys for resupply raids.” With a sly grin, he added, “Fewer training opportunities.”

  Mahnk raised a fist. “So I say we go to the lowlands,” he said.

  “To the lowlands,” nodded Darox.

  Mahnk frowned thoughtfully. “How long, I wonder, before we can take the fight into the New Cities?”

  “We need better psionics first,” said Darox.

  “True.”

  Darox grinned. “And we need to tear that chip out of your head,” he said.

  Mahnk looked ill.

  * * *

  Mahnk was the first fellow recruit Darox had met eight months earlier shortly after both were “liberated” (i.e., disabled by stun batons, then kidnapped). Skirmisher infiltration units had plucked them from separate ADVENT checkpoints outside New Seattle.

  Since then, they’d been shuttled nearly thirteen hundred miles, moving tribe to tribe along the old Canadian border and then southeast down the Divide. They ended up at Wildcat, a Skirmisher reorientation center on the Mosquito Range near Leadville, Colorado. Then came six hard months of boot camp.

  All Skirmishers, of course, were former ADVENT Troopers: hybrid clones, part human, part alien. But when liberated, new recruits had their neurochips immediately disabled with a pulsed radiofrequency ablation, an unpleasant, mind-scrambling experience. Suddenly cut off from the incessant flow of ADVENT’s tactical command and control, Skirmisher recruits became disoriented and often useless in combat.

  This called for extensive retraining.

  Over time, most new Skirmishers responded well to liberation and what they called “freethinking.” Rugged alpine training at eleven thousand feet in the high passes of Colorado’s Western Slope also meshed well with the hybrid’s physiology. ADVENT troops were genetically designed for hardship and spartan regimens.

  When a recruit’s retraining was complete, his neurochip was surgically removed in an initiation rite that included formal assignment to a Skirmisher tribe. If, like Darox, the recruit had also come from ADVENT’s officer corps, he might be designated a tactical combat commander as well.

  * * *

  Looking at Mahnk, Darox suddenly understood something about his new reality.

  “While
meditating, I had a thought,” he said. “It was an image, actually. Very vivid.”

  “What did you see?” asked Mahnk.

  “I saw myself in battle,” said Darox.

  Mahnk’s eyes brightened. “Excellent!” he said.

  Darox tapped his chest. “But I was fighting for ADVENT again,” he said. “Moving down the street of a shantytown, hunting rebels. I commanded a squad . . . but oddly, I was alone. As in those old days, the mission orders were my only thoughts. I was utterly alone with these thoughts.”

  Mahnk nodded solemnly. “That feeling is familiar,” he said.

  “I felt alien,” said Darox. “Or, more accurately, I felt the alien blood in me. I felt as the purebred alien must feel.”

  Mahnk closed his eyes. “I have that memory too. It is always very cold.”

  Darox smiled. “But then the image changed,” he said. “I saw myself advancing through woods with my Skirmisher brothers—you and the others.” He pointed ahead of him. “Our mission was similar, but my thoughts were different.”

  “How so, brother?”

  “The mission was important,” said Darox. “But my thoughts were with my team. Our mutual survival was paramount. Our tactics reflected that. We pushed ahead but always in support positions. Always watching each other’s back.”

  Mahnk nodded again. “True,” he said. “It is the Skirmisher way.”

  “It is the human way,” replied Darox. “This is the imperative of our human blood. Our feelings are stronger for each other than for the mission.” Another strong gust of wind rattled the hut. After a long silence, Mahnk turned up his palms. “Before we go . . . please, tell me what they’re going to pull out of my brain tomorrow.”

  Darox grinned and slowly uncrossed his legs. “It looks like a crystal spider.”

  Mahnk leaned back and blinked several times in horror.

  “What?!”

  “A spider,” repeated Darox. He held out his hand and wiggled his fingers.

  Mahnk looked ill.

  “Or maybe a jellyfish,” said Darox. He held his thumb and forefinger about a centimeter apart. “A small translucent capsule, this big, with long, threadlike tendrils.” His eyes narrowed. “I am told some of these extend well into the frontal lobe. Fortunately, they slide right out.”

  Mahnk stood up. He flipped open the tent flap.

  “I am going to be sick,” he said.

  Darox laughed, rose up himself, and clapped Mahnk on the back. As a former officer, he stood nearly six-and-a-half feet tall, a few inches taller than his compatriot.

  He said, “No, brother, you’re going to be free.”

  * * *

  Skirmisher culture was a curiosity.

  Its clan structure and tribal customs seemed to be rooted in deep wells of tradition, the product of generations of cultural evolution. An outsider might find it hard to believe, then, that the very first Skirmisher, Betos, not only was still breathing but also had founded the faction just two decades earlier. Even more curious: There wasn’t a Skirmisher alive who was more than twenty years old.

  The reason: Skirmishers were initially ADVENT Troopers “born” as mature warriors in top secret alien cloning labs. Strict chronology in years did not apply to their physical or mental development—not in a human sense, anyway. Darox, for example, was just eleven years old. Mahnk was eight.

  Nobody knew where these ADVENT birthing labs were located. And nobody knew the exact process; no Skirmisher retained that memory. But creation theories abounded. Some said ADVENT Troopers were built “from scratch,” emerging from a vat of DNA soup as identical clones, then genetically treated to create a narrow range of physical types. Others said troopers started as human “volunteers” who were mind-wiped, submerged in a bio-tank, and then subjected to alien DNA grafts. In this version, the process was said to trigger a gruesome and excruciating cell-by-cell transformation that took weeks to complete.

  Whatever the case, given how recently they’d been cracking heads as brutal ADVENT “peacekeepers,” Skirmisher initiates had to clear a high bar of trust, even within their own tribes. For the same reason, other Resistance cells regarded the entire Skirmisher faction with deep suspicion, even hostility.

  As a result, Skirmishers kept to themselves.

  They planned and executed anti-alien operations independent of other rebel groups. They stuck to the Wild Lands, scattering across the continent in nomadic, highly mobile clans. Over twenty years, their culture had grown increasingly insular, with unique and sometimes eccentric subcultures emerging from tribe to tribe.

  But one Skirmisher practice that never changed was the initiation rite.

  * * *

  Kneeling on a cushion, teeth gritted tightly in pain, Darox leaned forward, resting his head on a low padded podium. Two Skirmisher artists bent over him, jabbing at the back of his scalp with sterilized tattoo needles.

  The swollen flesh bordering his surgical lesion formed the barn-red back of a falcon—specifically, an American kestrel, the great ambush hunter of the high country. Vivid blue-gray wings spread on either side, wrapping the back of Darox’s skull. This was the tribal marking of the Kestrel clan of Skirmishers.

  Other than a small cadre of sentries posted out thirty miles in each direction, the entire Wildcat camp, including the reorientation staff and all initiates, attended the marking rite.

  As the artists added the final touches, a powerful, imposing figure in jet-black body armor rose from a camping stool. A red Ute-style ceremonial robe draped his massive shoulders. When the artists finished, he stepped in front of Darox and raised his hand.

  “Rise, brother,” he said.

  Darox lifted his head, wincing at the new pain on the back of his scalp. Still kneeling, he stared up at the face above him.

  “Do you know me?” asked the robed figure.

  “Yes,” said Darox, bowing his head.

  Every Skirmisher knew Mox. Once a much-feared ADVENT captain, he was now the right hand of the first-liberated Betos, founder of the Skirmisher clan. Darox had met Mox once before. The great leader had briefly inspected the newly liberated recruits outside New Seattle. Darox had been manacled in a cage then.

  “Are we kin?” asked Mox.

  “Every Skirmisher is kin,” said Darox, a mantra he’d heard at camp after camp a thousand times.

  “Then do not bow to me,” said Mox.

  Darox quickly raised his head. He looked up at Mox, whose eyes had darkened. The great leader folded his massive arms.

  “I will say it again,” said Mox. “Rise.”

  Now Darox stood.

  Mox leaned forward and said, “Never kneel again.” He jabbed at his own chest. “You are different inside. Do you understand?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good.” Mox stepped back and studied Darox. “I have heard about your close combat skills. Your trainers are quite impressed.”

  Darox raised his brow but said nothing. His Wildcat trainers were some of the fiercest and finest soldiers he’d ever seen. Far better than even the elite ADVENT officers he’d seen terrorize Resistance pockets in the townships ringing New Seattle.

  Abruptly, Mox turned toward a pair of warriors, one male and one female, standing separate from the surrounding audience. They bore the same American kestrel markings across the back of their skulls.

  “These are your tribe,” said Mox. “Tomorrow they will escort you up-country to your new home, where the others are preparing for the arrival of their new tactical officer.”

  Darox raised his brow again. “Officer?”

  Mox smiled slightly. “You have considerable command experience,” he said.

  “But only as ADVENT. I am not qualified to . . .”

  Mox cut him off. “You will report to Tashl, your tribal chief. You will oversee all combat operations from the high camp.”

  Darox knew the Kestrel were currently encamped in the Holy Cross Wilderness ten miles away and another three thousand feet higher than the Wildcat set
tlement. Like most Skirmisher tribes, they kept their community on the move; all base camps relocated every three to four weeks. He turned to face the two tribesmen. Fists clenched, each of them crossed both arms across their chest—the Skirmisher salute. Darox saluted in return.

  Suddenly, Mox’s adjutant Loka burst from the command hut, waving a PDA tablet. She approached Mox.

  “Shawnee Peak just went code orange,” she said. He held up the tablet. “We have ADVENT transports inbound from New Denver.”

  “How many?”

  “Five.”

  Mox gestured to the sky. “Are they in standard search spread?”

  Darox knew that an ADVENT squadron’s flight formation told you a lot about their intentions. Loka tapped something into the keypad. After a few seconds, she said, “They are in attack delta, sir. And moving fast.” The PDA beeped twice. “Ah, Mount Sherman spotters are now confirming approach.”

  “What vector?”

  The adjutant pointed down at the ground in front of Mox.

  Mox stared at her. “Here?”

  “Yes, sir,” she said. “Dead on.”

  Mox abruptly spun to the assembly. “Break down the huts,” he ordered. “You have four minutes.”

  As Darox stepped toward his hut, Mox held out his hand to stop him.

  “You,” he said. “Pick a recon partner and come with me.”

  YEARS OF HOSTILE RELATIONS with parties in all directions had taught Skirmisher tribes the value of “rapid decamp.” Even large-scale settlements like Wildcat could disappear in less time than an ADVENT Troop Transport could fly from a horizon sighting to ground zero.

  But this was the first time Darox had actually seen the drill live: an entire hut-village disassembled, shuttled into a dry-wash ravine, and stashed under sheets of camouflaged canvas. In fewer than five minutes, the two-acre site along old Highway 9 above Turquoise Lake reverted to a nondescript mountain meadow.

  Meanwhile, Mox and a team of six Wildcat trainers grabbed their gear. Darox was already in full battle dress for the ceremony, but he ducked inside his hut to snag his Kal-7 Bullpup shotgun before the camp crew could pack it up. As he emerged, weapon in hand, he spotted Mahnk hauling a gear bag to the tree line.