Robot Wars: Thrown Into the Fray

by Nicholas Haring

  “Akiyama is almost out of fifty-cal ammo, sir. She sent me to the supply drop area to retrieve some more ammo for her, but there wasn’t any; we haven’t received a new supply drop, sir.”

  “Son of a … Did you see Corporal Thompson out there?” Fischer asked.

  “No sir, and the bus -- it’s gone,” Lander said with his head slunk.

  “Gone? What do you mean gone?” Fischer asked; he knew if it was gone it was gone and there was little to be done about it.

  Before Lander could respond, Sanchez ran down the stairs and into the bunker.

  “Cap, I’m out of AR missiles and the Regs on our left flank are retreating in a hurry. We’re going to be cut-off if we don’t leave soon. Martin and Brookes are gathering up everyone for when you’re ready to bug-out,” Sanchez said and then gave a quick glance to the whiskey on the wall and then to Jones. “Has someone been partying down here?”

  Fischer knew they didn’t have much time left at this position. His options were limited. He couldn’t call-in Haggardson for an evac; if he were even still alive. Fischer quickly exited the bunker to see what was going on.

  Fischer could see Martin gathering up everyone as Brookes and Kazir provided cover, but straight off to the east he could see the Regs running for their lives; the Threes were lighting up their positions, engulfing them in a sea of flame and smoke. There were still pockets of desperate resistance here and there, but for all intents and purposes the frontline had fallen. It was time for the Dark Horses to get out of here before they were annihilated.

  Fischer looked up and around. There wasn’t a single Phaeton in the air. He wasn’t sure if they had all been shot down or were getting ready for another run, but he knew their radios were just as jammed as his. This meant no close-in air support to cover his retreat. Luckily, the last laser turret in their sector was still firing, but judging by the way it was shooting it was on an automated setting; the Regs had abandoned it already. Fischer had seen enough and went back down into the hideaway bunker.

  “Sanchez, I need you to quickly plant as many AR mines as you can. That should buy us some time,” Fischer said as Sanchez saluted and hurried out of the bunker. “Lander, go up and tell Akiyama we’re going to be leaving soon, and then you and her come down here and we’ll all leave together.”

  “Sir!” Lander saluted and then ran up the tower stairs; Jones giving him a death-glare as he ran by.

  “Jones! You said earlier that restarting the robot will turn it hostile?” Fischer asked.

  “Yeah… but it’ll just be an indiscriminate killing machine, firing at everything that moves,” Jones said.

  “Good, how long will it take to restart?” Fischer asked.

  “Umm… I don’t know, probably about ten minutes, but … oh, I think I see, sir,” Jones said as he started working on his PCC just as Lander and Akiyama came down the stairs. Jones ignored them as they walked up to Fischer.

  “The Regs all down the line are retreating, sir, and the snag wire is about to completely fail and give way in our sector,” Akiyama said as she glanced at Jones and then back at Fischer.

  Martin came down the stairs and gave a thumbs-up; everyone was ready to go.

  “All right, meet up at the supply drop, we’ll activate that Four, and then get the hell out of here.

  “Where’s the rendezvous point?” Martin asked.

  “The old courthouse in town, and then from there to the other side of the river; Grantsburg is lost,” Fischer said, his eyes met Lander’s when he said it, and saw the realization set in for him.

  Everyone, but Fischer and Jones exited the Bunker. Jones was trying to get his R-99 unit packed-up. Fischer grabbed Jones by the arm and the two exited the bunker as Jones protested leaving his brand new bulky radio behind.

  *****

  “Everyone here?” Fischer asked as the unit gathered up at the supply area.

  “Everyone except for Corporal Thompson and Private Samson,” Martin said as the terrible foghorn noise sounded not too far-away. The remaining laser turret in their sector exploded violently. “I think we need to get out of here soon, sir.”

  Fischer signaled to Jones to restart the Four. Jones nodded, typed on his PCC, and then put it away.

  “We’ve got less than fifteen minutes to get out of range, sir,” Jones said.

  “All right everyone, we have five clicks to run, from here back to the cover of town. When we get close to the second line halfway back to town we may come under friendly mortar fire, but keep running. Everyone understand?” Fischer asked as he looked at the squad; Ellerby looked like he was scared shitless, but everyone else looked ready just to get out of here.

  Fischer gave a quick look up and down the line. The robots were breaking through hundreds, thousands at a time all over, but in their sector the snag wire was holding, but just barely. There were seven Mark Fours remaining, but luckily they were spread out over the valley. The faster Mark Threes were pursuing the fleeing Regs as some units tried to fight pitched delaying actions.

  Fischer knew the valley narrowed once again before the second line. The passes that led to Leesville and Sherman were also there. He knew that if they could make it past the second line they had a really good chance to make it back to town. He looked to the north; it didn’t seem as though the robots had broken through there. If it was as Jones had said, all of the robot army was behind them.

  “The process is half-way completed, sir,” Jones said.

  “Okay, let’s go!” Fischer ordered and the group started its way north.

  Chapter 35

  Brookes was running for her life as incoming shells began exploding all around her. She could tell from the sound of them that they were being shot from behind. The aim was more scattered than precise as the group ran through it.

  She was in the middle of the pack. Everyone was pretty spread out, no more than ten meters apart. Fischer and Hartford were in front of her. Martin and Sanchez were off to her left; Akiyama, Cross, Porter, and Riley were to her right. Jones was close behind her, and lagging behind some distance were Lander and Ellerby. Brookes didn’t really look to see why.

  They were almost to the second defensive line – it was completely abandoned. She could see the gray courthouse off in the distance, so prominent over the other buildings in town. She focused on it as she continued to run toward her goal.

  As Brookes intently focused on the courthouse, she then heard something whiz in the air above her, and then suddenly, a cloud of dust kicked up in her face. She looked down and saw that a shell had landed right in front of her. It hadn’t exploded. It lay smoking, half-buried in a small crater. Brookes stood there frozen for a moment, until Jones ran into the back of her. She almost fell onto the dud. Jones staggered, but kept running on, only looking back for a brief moment at Brookes as she laid face-down on the ground.

  “Are you all right, Lieutenant?” Cross asked as she and Akiyama ran over. The rest of the group continued on. Brookes nodded, picked herself up, and kept running.

  Brookes kept her focus on the courthouse; she was determined to make it. She was upon trench before she knew it, seeing it just in time before she fell in.

  Cross, Akiyama, and she jumped over it without too much trouble and kept running. The three had just ran passed an old abandoned farmhouse on their right when Brookes heard Lander yell out Ellerby’s name. Brookes kept running, but looked behind her to see that Ellerby had fallen into the trench and Lander was trying to help him up.

  “Cross - Aki, Ellerby and Lander need our help!” Brookes yelled as she stopped, turned, and ran back. The shells were coming down heavier now, some of them sounded like they were coming from the town; the robots were getting close.

  “Keep moving!” Fischer yelled in the distance.

  The three ran back to help, but stopped when they saw Lander had pulled Ellerby out of the trench. The two of them were running as fast as they could towards Brookes and the others. Ellerby was running slow; it looked as though
he were running on fumes or sprained something in the fall.

  “Keep running!” Fischer yelled again.

  Cross and Akiyama continued as Brookes waited for Lander and Ellerby.

  “Go on, we’re fine!” Lander yelled, motioning for her to go.

  Brookes heard an incoming shell; it was close. She was just about to turn around and run when an explosion behind Lander and Ellerby sent them flying; Ellerby off to the left and Lander into a small stone wall in front of him.

  “Lander! Ellerby!” Brookes cried out.

  Brookes started running back when more shells came down, throwing up a wall of shrapnel and flame in front of her. It was too much for her; she had to stop, just then, she felt someone grab her right arm and yank it backwards; it was Fischer.

  “Keep moving, dammit!” Fischer yelled as he pulled on Brookes’ arm. “They’re dead and we will be too if we don’t get the hell out of here!”

  Brookes started running and didn’t look back. The rest of group was almost to the old encampment near the high school. The adrenaline was really starting to kick-in as she followed closely behind Fischer. They were almost out of it. Just a little further, Brookes thought.

  Brookes could now see an MP checkpoint up ahead. There was one JLTV with a machinegun and two MPs guarding the intersection outside of the high school encampment.

  “Keep going, we’ll cover you!” The corporal on the machinegun yelled as he waved them down the road.

  The two started to open fire after Brookes ran past. She looked back. The robot mass was being broken up by the fire from the mortar brigade. A mortar shell hit the old farmhouse and blew it up, sending wooden boards and bricks flying in all directions. The robots became scattered as the mortar brigade started to walk their fire south, creating a seemingly impenetrable barrier of destruction. Brookes turned around and kept running. The two MPs at the checkpoint behind her, continued to fire as the squad ran towards the courthouse.

  *****

  Brookes was out of breath when they made it to the courthouse. A cold rain started coming down just moments ago as the squad sat down to rest on the sidewalk out front of the now commandeered building. Brookes looked at the courthouse and then at the other buildings downtown, a unit of Regs -- possibly a battalion -- was set up inside and around in the other buildings. An artillery spotting unit was on the rooftop of the courthouse, she could hear them calling in fire orders, but couldn’t make out any details.

  The group - now minus Lander and Ellerby - had made it safely to downtown Grantsburg. They sat outside in the rain for another ten minutes, until Fischer motioned over to them. He had kicked down the door of an old, abandoned brick building; it had a faded sign out front with broken neon tubes. Brookes could barely make out “Willis Drug” on the sign as she walked closer.

  The squad entered the old drug store. Hartford, Sanchez, Kazir, and Martin sat down at the dusty stools that hugged an old soda fountain. Everyone else sat down at the tables by the partially boarded and broken windows.

  The old red and white vinyl tile floors, covered in debris and other filth, crunched under Brookes’ boots as she walked in and tried to find a place to sit. She found a nice spot next to a dusty, corroded jukebox in the back. She sat down across from Riley who nervously rubbing his hands. Her knees were killing her, throbbing non-stop as she began to rub them lightly. She took a deep breath, exhaled, and closed her eyes. She tried to not think about watching Ellerby and Lander die, or the picture of Samson and his father resting in her left breast pocket.

  She opened her eyes and looked around. The place had definitely seen better days. It looked like it had once been a retro 1950’s soda fountain; pictures of Elvis and old Cadillac convertibles adorned the walls. It all seemed rather cheesy and tacky to her.

  Brookes glanced at Riley, his head was now down on the table; he looked completely spent. Everyone else was closer to the front door as they all sat in silence, except for Sanchez who was looking around curiously.

  Brookes thought back to her college days as she looked over at an old glass coffee pot on the wooden counter behind the soda fountain. She thought about the retro aught coffee shops that were so popular in the hipper parts of New Omaha and how she thought they were pretty lame. Her ex-boyfriend and his friends used to hang-out at the one nearest to the college all the time; they would talk about nothing and surf the net for hours as they sipped on their overpriced coffees. She would come most times to hang-out when she was bored. She tried to like the whole coffee shop experience at first, or at least pretend to, but the sameness of it all started to drag on her fast and wear her out. It never seemed like it meant anything at all to her at the time.

  Brookes rolled her eyes as she took her focus off the coffee pot and looked to its left, at the bizarre looking cat clock on the wall behind the soda fountain. Just as Brookes became fixated on the dark eyes of the cat clock, Fischer came back into the drug store; she turned to look at him. He looked to his left and right, stopped when he spotted her, and then motioned for her to come over.

  “Take five, everyone. Brookes, come with me,” Fischer said as Brookes stood up, wincing slightly as she did, and then walked over to Fischer and followed him out the doorway.

  The rain had started to let up to a drizzle as Brookes followed Fischer away from the drug store to the other side of the street. The downtown area was hurried with activity, soldiers running every which way, all getting ready for the fight that was surely going to come through town.

  “Brookes, I can’t have you pausing all the time, slowing us down. You could’ve gotten one us killed out there. We had to keep moving, understand?” Fischer said, but he wasn’t looking at her when he said it; he was scanning around, looking for someone.

  “I couldn’t leave anyone behind, sir,” Brookes said. “I was trying to make sure we all made it back.”

  “I know, Lieutenant. And in any other circumstance I would’ve given you praise. But we were all exposed out there. Ellerby and Lander were lagging behind. Could you have made them run any faster by going back and helping them?” Fischer asked, and then finally looked at her.

  “Well, no -- not really. Ellerby had fallen into the trench. I tried to go back and help Lander pull him out …”

  “Yes, and if you had, you’d be dead right now. In this war we have to make a lot of tough decisions; lord knows I have. But you have to think smarter in situations like that. I need you a lot more than I need two temporary Reservists, do you understand?”

  Brookes was shocked by what Fischer had just said; the cold brutality of it. She had always been told -- ever since she was a kid that the heroic Captain Fischer never left a soldier behind, and always held steadfast in the face of impossible odds. Reality was something different entirely. They had just run from the enemy, and now he was telling her that her life was worth more than Lander’s or Ellerby’s? She didn’t agree with it at all.

  Brookes didn’t know how to react at first, she wanted to tell Fischer he was wrong, but he had way more experience than her. This was only her first battle after all. She stood there for a second, unsure how to respond, but Fischer looked to be wanting one, probably wanting to know if she and him were on the same page.

  “What if it was Akiyama, Sanchez, or even Jones who had fallen into that trench, Captain?” Brookes asked; she was a little furious that her commander seemed to only care about his unit’s self-preservation above all others.

  Fischer was about to respond when someone yelled for the two down the street. Brookes and Fischer turned to see Captain Rhodes running up to meet them.

  “There you guys are. We didn’t see your bus during the retreat, feared you were overrun,” Rhodes said; he looked genuinely happy and relieved to see them.

  “It was close, Rhodes. Our bus disappeared. I think one of the reservists assigned to us, took it, and fled with it,” Fischer said.

  “Shit, I’m sorry, Fish. You can never trust those Reservists sometimes. Do you know who it was? Want m
e to report them in?” Rhodes asked.

  Fischer glanced at Brookes for a split-second.

  “Nah, the MPs have a lot more on their plate than a stolen bus and a deserter. How are you and Harlan, what’s your statuses?” Fischer asked.

  “My troops are okay, but we’ve both lost a lot of our assigned Reservists. They should’ve never been out there, but I guess we had no choice, right? Harlan is down to fifty-percent strength. She lost most of them when a Three flamed their lines,” Rhodes said, crossing his arms and shaking his head.

  “Where’s Harlan now?” Fischer asked as he looked around a little.

  “She’s in the courthouse talking with some of the local commanders about setting up an effective delaying action. No one knows where General Williams or any of his colonels are. The lack of comms has everyone in the dark,” Rhodes said.

  “Hmm… not much we can do about that now; we’ll have to make do with what we have. Do you know where in the courthouse they are?” Fischer asked.

  “Sure, follow me,” Rhodes said as he motioned to Fischer.

  Brookes started to follow too, but Fischer turned around and pointed to the drug store.

  “Brookes, I need you to stay with everyone. We’ll probably be moving out soon again; I need everyone ready,” Fischer said, and then turned and headed into the courthouse with Rhodes.

  “Sir,” Brookes half-heartily saluted and then walked back to the drug store.

  *****

  “I’m telling you it doesn’t work anymore!” Hartford said just as Brookes walked back into the drug store.

  Sanchez was behind the counter at the soda fountain; it looked as though he was trying to get it working.

  “I bet I can get it to work. All I need is some elbow grease and the ol’ know-how,” Sanchez said as he fiddled with some stuff. “Besides, I always wanted to be a soda jerk.”

  “What are you talking about? Last week you told me how you always wanted to be a stock broker, and then three weeks before that a professional pumpkin carver,” Hartford said as Brookes sat down next to Porter, without anyone really noticing her.