by S D Tanner
An army ran more on self-belief than it did on reality, otherwise no sane person would run toward a bullet. Ginger believed following him was better than being a toy soldier and, rather than tell the truth, he tightened his jaw hoping to show strength.
“We’re integrating the civilian army with ours, and reconning one of the enemy production sites. Once we’re ready, we’ll set up the attack run.”
Hawk nodded as if he believed him, but he suspected the man knew the truth. Turning to the flight squad, Hawk said loudly, “Wheels up. Get ready for teleport.”
He and Hawk were the first to teleport to a beacon, and he found himself bent inside of the curved cockpit. Hawk stepped forward and stuck a puck-shaped pulser on the clone’s back. The clones were docile and, although Judge had been willing to kill them, Hawk had a better plan. All they had to do was attach a pulser onto the clone and Joker or Jess could teleport them. Within seconds, the clone disappeared as Joker teleported him onto the Extrema.
Hawk clearly knew what he was doing with the controls, and the beacon moved forward smoothly. Like the other beacon he’d been on, this one was orbiting Earth and he could see a polar cap below them.
“Squad, report in,” Hawk ordered.
“Bravo-one-seven is under control.”
“Bravo-two-four is under control.”
One-by-one, the hastily assembled flight squad reported their beacon number and status. Taking control of the beacons seemed easy enough, and he felt himself relaxing. Still holding onto the roof of the curved cockpit, his balance shifted as Hawk flew beneath the orbiting beacons.
“Bravo-Six to Extrema, report status.”
“This is the Extrema, all pilots successfully teleported,” Joker replied.
“Bravo-Six to all pilots. Move forward, but take it easy.”
Despite his warning, the open communications line filled with cursing.
“Goddamn!”
“Woah, boy!”
“Shit, shit, shit!”
“Bravo-Six to all pilots. Get your birds under control.” Hawk’s calmly spoken words seemed to have the right effect, and the voices on the communication channel sounded less panicked.
“Roger that. Bravo-three-eight is flying smooth.”
“Bravo-two-nine is good.”
“Slow is smooth. Smooth is fast,” Hawk intoned.
His body jolted backward as Hawk accelerated the beacon ahead of his squad. “All pilots, follow my lead.”
The flight squad were following one another like a column of waddling baby ducklings chasing their mother. Impressed at how easily they’d taken control of the beacons and wondering if he could steal more, a panicked voice sounded in his ear. “Bravo-one-five is taking fire!”
“Bravo-one-five. Evasive maneuvers,” Hawk replied steadily.
His body leaned to the left and their beacon picked up speed, until he could see another one jerking left and right toward the line of ducklings, clearly out of control. Three more enemy beacons were behind it, trying to follow its mad flight path. Hawk lined up his beacon until it was facing one of the enemy, but once he was in position it jolted to the left. Refusing to give up, Hawk pursued it, trying to line it up in his sights.
“Hawk?”
“Gimme a minute, Tag. It’s not easy being a rifle.”
“Bravo-two-six is taking fire!”
Hawk swung his beacon until it was facing his squad that had been lined up behind him. Enemy beacons were swarming their position and firing a wall of missiles at them.
“Hawk!”
“I know, I know.”
Their beacon flipped up and he was thrown against the back of the cockpit, and then the floor adjusted to the angle. Hawk was firing at the beacons targeting his squad. Lining the hull with missiles was both a blessing and curse, and it only took a single hit for one to explode in a flutter of shrapnel.
He recognized Jack’s voice on the communication channel. “Bravo-Seven to Bravo-Six. We gotta get outta here.”
Jack’s warning came a second too late for one of their beacons and it exploded into a starburst of metal. “Hawk! Get ‘em outta here!”
Clinging to the console next to Hawk, he anxiously peered through the wide window, scanning the skies for more beacons. The air in front of them was so thick with flying round balls, it was impossible to know which ones were their beacons versus the enemy’s.
“Bravo-Six to all pilots. Head into space. Flak, you’re with me. We’ll cover their six.”
For a moment, only their pilots responded to the order, and dozens flicked upward, heading away from Earth. He only managed to watch the departing flight squad for a few seconds, and then fifty more beacons chased them into orbit.
“Don’t lose them out there, Hawk,” he warned.
“Quit nagging, Tag. Bravo-Six to all pilots. Head to the dark side.”
“Why there? The arks are unarmed.”
Joker’s voice sounded through his earpiece. “Nah, it’s all good. It’ll thin the herd.”
Hawk followed his squad into space while targeting and firing at the enemy from behind. More of the enemy beacons exploded before managing to leave Earth’s atmosphere. Bursting through the last of gravity, their beacon turned a fiery red as it entered space, but the squad were now so widely scattered he wondered if they would ever find one another again.
“You should go, Tag,” Hawk said steadily.
“But…”
Twisting in his seat, Hawk took one hand from the controls. “This is my problem, Tag. Go be a Commander.”
Hawk was right, they were his flight squad and this was his mission. Although Hawk and Flak could behave like idiots, he respected the man for showing gravitas when it was needed. Nodding to Hawk, he said, “See you on the other side.” Straightening as well as he could inside the curved cockpit, he looked at Hawk for what he hoped wouldn’t be the last time. “Joker, teleport me to the ship.”
CHAPTER SIXTEEN: Buying Real Estate
Seeing him materialize on the Bridge, Judge began hassling him. “I’ve put together a squad to recon the production city.” He flicked his head at Rok. “We’ve left a squad on each of the three arks and sent the rest of the troops to the city with Ash.”
Rok gave him a lazy grin, as if he’d slept well on the dark side of the moon. “The Jess on our arks teleported us home.” Winking at the robot Jessica sitting at the console next to Joker, he added, “Of course, our Jess was hotter.”
Stock frowned, seemingly confused. “Aren’t they identical robots?”
Shaking his head, Judge replied, “Don’t listen to Rok, he’s an idiot.”
“Name calling is not allowed,” Rok replied defiantly and then turned to look at him. “Isn’t that right, Tag?”
“It’s not name calling if it’s true,” he replied sharply. Spinning on his heel, he strode to where Joker was sitting. “What happened to the flight squad?”
Joker didn’t look up from the screen he was watching. “You have control issues.”
“Joker,” he growled.
Finally spinning his chair around, Joker grinned. “Unclench, dude. Hawk and Flak are experienced pilots and Jack’s a fast learner. That kid has some serious cahoonas.”
Jessica took his hand and smiled up at him. “They lost three beacons, but the other thirty-eight are now secure.”
“What happened to the enemy beacons?”
Joker replied, “Hawk and Jack have gotten pretty good with those missiles and Flak is catching up fast. It helps that the clones can’t fight worth shit.”
He was always happy to see Jessica, and he squeezed her hand before letting it go. Unfortunately, she was an indulgence he couldn’t afford. There was something more to why he wanted to rescue her, but he didn’t want to think about it. The human version of her was critical to his mission, or at least that’s what he was telling himself. When it came to forming emotional attachments, his shield was always up, but he was
struggling to deny she was getting to him.
Thirty-eight beacons with untrained pilots wasn’t much of a fleet, but it would have to do. Frowning at Joker, he asked, “What’s Hawk doing now?”
Joker sighed. “Micro manage much?”
“Joker…”
“Yeah, yeah, I get it, you’re the boss.” Joker spun his chair so all he could see was the back of his head. “He’s training them to use the beacons.”
From the other end of the Bridge, Judge shouted, “Tag! Gotta go.”
Still annoyed with Joker, but knowing he had to let it go, he walked toward Judge. “Aren’t you interested in the mission you planned?”
“Nope, saw it on cam. Looked good.”
“We were attacked by a swarm of beacons and lost three.”
“It was an excellent result.”
“But now we only have thirty-eight beacons.”
“Better than a kick in the head.” Flicking his head at him, Judge added, “Joker says if we drop pulsers around anything we want then he can grab it, so I’m taking a couple hundred of them. If we find any weapons in the city then we can drop the pulsers.”
Events were overtaking him and, as he struggled to shift gears, all he could do was nod at Judge. “Glad you agree. We know what’s at the bottom of the city, so I figure we should head topside. Joker will teleport us to the highest point and we can work our way down. The clones shouldn’t be a problem, but the enemy teleported robot gunners in last time we were there. I figure we’ll get maybe thirty minutes before they realize we’re inside and then it’ll be time to go.”
Slowly registering Judge’s words, he shook his head hoping to clear his foggy brain. “Wait a minute. Why aren’t we going in with more firepower?”
“Because we don’t have any. Keep up, Tag. That’s whole reason we’re going in at all.”
“I know that, but we could take in a hundred troopers.”
Joker spun around in his chair. “We talked about that. If you do, then I’ll be forced to call it between pulling out troops or any weapons you might find. Which one do you want more?”
Everything was a compromise and it wasn’t something he did well. His brain was happiest with black and white decisions where something was obviously right. Sighing, he replied, “Fine, but I thought you wanted to blow the city.”
“Not if it has the weapons we need,” Judge replied. “This is just a recon. If we find what we need then we take over the city.”
“Can we do that? Occupy a city.”
“Only if we take the ones around it.”
Half-turning toward Joker, he said, “Joker, put a map of the cities on the screen.” Flickering to life, the screen settled on an aerial view of Earth. As the screen moved, it narrowed until it showed the production city. “Zoom out again.”
As the image widened more cities came into view. In total, he counted five within a hundred-mile radius. From above, the cities were at least a mile wide and perfectly white. Although several were taller and bulkier, looking down on them they shared the same oval footprint. They blended so perfectly with the sky that had they not been a common shape and size, then they could have been mistaken for clouds. One of them was the city where Jessica was being held prisoner, and he ran his hand over the screen, forming a circle around the five cities. “This is our real estate.”
“You want to take five cities?” Judge asked in surprise.
If truth were told then he wanted to take the entire planet, but he’d settle for five cities from this fight. “Nope, I want the whole planet.”
Judge’s harsh laughter made him turn around to face him. “Rescuing Jessica isn’t the mission, it’s only a firefight.” Looking back at the screen, he spoke with more confidence than he felt. “If we stand a chance of taking back the country and the world, then we’re going to need a base.” Running his hand down the screen as if to familiarize himself with his future home, he nodded appreciatively. “This will do nicely.”
Joining him to look at the five suspended cities floating gracefully in the air, Judge replied, “We don’t have the firepower to do that. If the enemy teleport in gunners, then we’ll wreck the cities trying to take them. Why not set up ground bases?”
He shook his head. “We’d be sitting ducks for the hunters and beacons. If we’re in the air, then at least one of them is not a problem.”
“What about the civvies?”
“They’ve survived this long and we can leave troops with them.”
“So, you just want your own ivory tower.” For a moment, he thought Judge might rebel, but then he sighed. “Yeah, ok, but I’ll need time to plan.”
“And weapons, Judge. We need weapons.”
Snorting derisively, Judge replied, “Yeah, some of those would be nice too.”
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN: Santa’s Elves
Joker was becoming more accurate with the teleporter, and he materialized them inside a room at the highest point of the city. The outside walls were a brilliant white and stretched below the city as if he were inside Rapunzel’s tower, but he’d been told more than once that he was no Prince Charming.
“Joker, we’re down and safe.”
“I know. I can see you on the cams.”
He might trust Joker to keep an eye on them, but same couldn’t be said for the crew he would eventually train to use the teleporter. Just drawing a line around the cities had been enough to make him believe there could be a future. The army had Standard Operating Procedures for everything, and his newly formed Dead Force would need rules. Although they were running around like headless chickens now, it couldn’t last. He would either take his real estate or lose everything trying.
Five men including Rok were with them. Rok was carrying his standard KLAW, and the others were armed with EMC-8 carbines. Compared to the hundreds of guns they’d stolen from the robot gunners, they had less than a hundred carbines, so he assumed Judge had pillaged the weapons from their meager supplies. Turning toward the only exit from the room, he used his gun to signal Rok to take point.
“Stay frosty. Don’t waste ammo. Don’t shoot the clones.”
“Why not?” Rok asked unhappily.
“They’re human.”
Judge nudged him from behind with what he suspected was the barrel of his gun. “When are you going to stop thinking humans are more important than anyone else?”
He followed Rok through the gap in the wall. “Earth belongs to humans.”
“Says who?” Judge asked.
The center of the tower was hollow and he peered over the edge to the base below. It was narrower at the top than it was at the bottom, and the path against the wall spiraled downward. “It’s the natural order of things.”
Looking over the edge with him, Judge replied, “Only to you.”
Rok was trudging down the spiral pathway, his gun pointed forward as if something might leap out at him, which he supposed it might. “Tag doesn’t do change well.”
The path was white and so were the walls, making it difficult to know where one started and the other ended. It was like walking through a marshmallow tunnel, only it didn’t smell sweet. Maybe it was caused by the production lines at the bottom of the city, but the tower stank of molten metal. The city with Jessica had been elaborately designed with complex rooms and tunnels, but this one struck him as more functional, as if it had been custom built to make heavy equipment. Although from the outside the city had appeared the same as the others, he wondered if each one was configured differently based on its purpose.
“Do you think this city is alive like the other one is?”
“Why do you think the other one was alive?” Judge asked.
“It helped us.”
“It could have been programmed. You know how our enemy like their bots.”
Rok had stopped, appearing to be staring at a blank, white a wall. “Rok, what have you got?”
“I think it’s another gap, but all this whit
e on white is making it hard to see.”
When Rok disappeared into the wall, he assumed it was another gap. Picking up his pace, he slid on the smooth floor until he reached the spot where Rok had disappeared. “What’s inside?”
“More of the same.”
He could keep going down the spiral path until he reached the bottom, but that would only lead them to the beacon production room, and he already knew what was in there. Following Rok into the room, he said, “Keep moving.”
The room had another gap in the far wall that led them into another room, but he was sure they were slowly sloping downward. None of the rooms appeared to contain anything until they reached the next room. Tall, curved vats sat in rows, piled one next to the other. If Joker was right about the production line being a 3D copier, then the oversized tubs might contain the source material they used to make the equipment. Given they were so far from the bottom of the city, he could only hope that was the case. It might mean there was another production floor nearby and, if he was very lucky, it might make the armor and guns his troops needed.
“What do you think?” Judge asked.
“Could be source material for the copiers.”
“This far from the shop floor?”
Joker’s voice sounded in his earpiece. “Makes sense. They could top load the source material and use gravity to feed it into the production rooms below.”
Studying the vats, he said, “Maybe there’s another production line near here.”
“It’s gotta be somewhere,” Judge replied confidently.
Hoping his instinct was more than just optimism, he asked, “How do you figure that?”
“The Dead Force were sleeping in their armor and we know soldiers treat their gear like shit. They’re being resupplied somehow, so they’ve got to make the stuff somewhere.”
Pleased to hear his own thinking echoed back at him, he asked, “Should we open a barrel?”
Judge tapped one the vats and it made a dull knocking sound, suggesting it might be full. Screwing up his face, Judge shook his head. “For all we know this stuff is toxic and we’ve got enough problems.”