Crysis: Escalation

by Gavin G. Smith

  The third man was sat opposite Harper. He had no hair and was thin, verging on the gaunt. He looked to be in his eighties but in very good shape for it. His eyes seemed younger, somehow. They were very much alive. He looked familiar to Harper, like someone he had seen on television.

  ‘Do you know who I am?’ the man asked. He had a strong German accent. Harper finally placed the man.

  ‘You’re Karl Ernst Rasch, the ousted head of Hargreave-Rasch BioChemical,’ Harper said warily. He glanced at Fenn and Fry.

  ‘And Cry-Net Systems, who own CELL , who in turn now own the Royal Navy. Or should that be the CELL navy?’

  ‘My name is…’ Harper started.

  ‘We know who you are. We have had your identity confirmed.’

  Harper didn’t even ask how.

  ‘And these gentlemen?’ Harper asked.

  ‘Don’t particularly want their names known,’ the stern-looking man said. He was clearly used to command. Something about him made Harper think special forces. He wore no insignia on his uniform, just a small stars and stripes patch on one shoulder.

  ‘You are the Captain of the Robin Hood?’ Rasch said. Harper nodded.

  ‘They know where you are,’ Harper told them.

  ‘That was to be expected. Whilst I was CEO at Hargreave-Rasch I was aware of the contract to provide the Robin Hood. I am aware of its rather frightening capabilities. CELL have chosen not to deploy what used to be the US marines in New York due to fear of mutiny. Provably loyal CELL military contractors defend the city. In many ways, the Robin Hood is our biggest threat.’ He paused as if considering something. ‘Some would say it is an odd thing for its Captain to be riding around South East Yonkers at this time of night.’

  ‘I need to know why,’ Harper told Rasch. Corporal Fenn turned her head as if to look at him through the hood.

  ‘Are we courting the HMS Robin Hood?’

  ‘I need to know that this isn’t some kind of corporate vendetta.’

  ‘Think we’d be here if it was, ese?’ the Hispanic soldier asked him.

  ‘Please take the hoods off my men,’ Harper said. ‘And we’re unarmed, you can remove our restraints, you have my word that we will take no actions against you.’

  The Hispanic soldier laughed. Rasch looked to the stern-looking soldier, who nodded. The Hispanic soldier took the hoods off Fry and Fenn and then cut the cable ties off their hands with a knife that bordered on machete-sized. The marines rubbed their wrists and looked around but said nothing.

  ‘I would imagine,’ Rasch began. ‘That like most rational people, you have significant doubts as regards the privatisation of previously national militaries.’

  ‘A national military is accountable to its government and ultimately to its people. A company is accountable to its shareholders at best, but more likely its bottom line.’

  ‘I left Hargreave-Rasch, a company I helped found…’ That can’t be right, Harper thought. Somewhere at the back of his mind he was sure that the biomedical company had been founded in the early 20th century. ‘Because I had become significantly concerned with its practices. The company as itself was out of control. There was no one person running it, no strong personality with a grasp of morality at the helm after the death of my partner Jacob Hargreave.’

  ‘Yourself?’

  ‘It was easy to get rid of me when I started objecting to policy. There was a board-wide vote of no confidence. The problem is that it is a company doing what a company will do, taking corporate capitalism to its nth degree because there is nothing to tell it to stop. With the energy monopoly, it now has endless resources. It has stopped being something that we would recognise as a business. Instead it behaves like a particularly rapacious virus. It will consume and consume until there is nothing left. It is the corporate meme out of control, and it will settle for nothing else than total global domination.’

  ‘Is that not the nature of the system?’ Harper asked.

  ‘Do you mean, “has someone won capitalism”?’ Rasch asked.

  The stern-looking soldier snorted and shook his head.

  ‘Tell that to the people it’s enslaving, holmes,’ the Hispanic soldier said grimly.

  ‘This “live debt-free” scheme?’ Harper asked.

  ‘See, the energy they have is supposed to be generated free, right?’ the Hispanic soldier continued. ‘So they undercut the opposition and drive them out of business, then the costs start rising and rising. People get in debt if they want to be warm and cook and shit. So they look at this scheme, but once they’re in that’s it. They never quite seem to get out of debt. CELL owns them.’

  ‘Modern day indentured service,’ Rasch said. ‘And it’s not like they can really refuse to use CELL’s products. Now I’m the first to admit that democracy is a flawed system. It certainly got in my way more than once when I was CEO, and we used well-paid lobbyists to hijack it when it suited us to do so. At its basest democracy is legitimatised mob rule but I suspect we’ll miss it when it’s gone.’

  ‘And you feel a terrorist attack is the way to get your point across?’ The two soldiers with Rasch bristled at the word “terrorist”. Fry was trying to suppress a grin. Corporal Fenn remained impassive but kept on looking behind her into the darkness in the corner of the room.

  ‘If I could vote against it, write to my congressman or otherwise do anything about it, I would. I was probably the singularly most well-placed person to stop this company running out of control and I couldn’t. We’re not trying to get our point across, or terrorise anyone. We have a very specific goal to accomplish.’ The craggy-faced soldier cleared his throat. Rasch turned to look at him. ‘We will get nowhere with half-truths and obfuscations, Major.’ He turned back to Harper. ‘We are going after the mechanism for the CELL global monopoly on energy. The Ceph are a threat, and we will deal with them later, but right now we need to prevent my old company becoming even more powerful.’

  ‘It’s here in New York?’

  Rasch didn’t answer. The stern-looking major looked less than pleased. Harper realised that he was dead if he didn’t join them. It might not even be that simple. Even if he agreed he would have to convince them he meant it.

  ‘They’ll hit you with the Archangel,’ Harper told them. Rasch was shaking his head. ‘They have to. If the source of their control is in the city they’ll have no choice.’

  ‘They can’t risk it. They may damage some of their valuable resources. Captain, it’s no coincidence that CELL are using New York as their base. They are harvesting the aliens’ technology and believe me, the last people in the world you want with that technology is a global super power that is accountable to no-one. Not if you ever want to live free again.’

  ‘Hyperbole,’ Harper said, finding himself angry. No, not angry, he thought, frightened.

  ‘We look like peaceniks, pinkos and hippies to you?’ the Major asked. ‘You know military men and women. What do you think it would take for them to get to the point where they are prepared to take an action like this?’

  Distractedly Harper noticed Fenn glancing behind again. He was tempted to look himself.

  ‘I think you know this is true, Captain. I think that you have watched it slither slowly in over the past few years like a snake. I think you’ve known it was happening but desperately wanted someone else to handle it. Well, we’ve run out of people to handle it. There’s just us, here, now and as you can imagine we have a lot to do so I’m afraid I’m going to have to press you for an answer.’

  Harper swallowed hard.

  ‘I’ll help you,’ Harper said. Somehow it still felt like betraying his country. Rasch nodded and then looked into the corner where Fenn had been looking.

  ‘Dane. Is he telling the truth?’

  Harper watched as darkness seemed to recede around a massive and very powerful looking figure. It’s a cloak, Harper realised in amazement. The revealed figure was bizarre. It wore some sort of armoured exoskeleton made of thick, muscle-like cable. Half of t
he armour’s torso and helmet were painted white to resemble a skull and bones. Beads, feathers, bones and the skulls of rodents and birds were affixed to the armour in various places. The armoured figure wore a number of dog tags on a chain around his neck. There was a large automatic at his hip and he had some kind of sniper rifle in a sheath across his back.

  ‘His stress markers are all to shit,’ a surprisingly spacy sounding voice said. ‘But he’s telling the truth.’ The figure was looking away from the six people, as if staring at something none of them could see. Harper, Fenn and Fry were staring at the armoured man.

  ‘Are you an alien?’ Fry asked. The figure turned around to look at the scouse marine.

  ‘No,’ he said simply. The scouser looked crestfallen.

  ‘Yes, I could see why you’d be disappointed,’ Harper said to the marine.

  Dane turned to Fenn. ‘You’re good.’

  Fenn didn’t reply. She just watched the figure suspiciously.

  Rasch looked up at the major.

  ‘Major Winterman?’

  The Major was giving some thought to this.

  ‘I don’t like this,’ Winterman finally said. ‘There are too many ifs. Yes, the Robin Hood would be of a tremendous amount of use, possibly pivotal, but even allowing for the good captain’s willingness he still has a sizeable crew that needs to do as he says.’

  ‘The Major is right,’ Harper said. ‘Normally the discipline on a royal navy ship is excellent. CELL’s takeover has changed things. There are elements on board that would oppose supporting you and others who would wish to distance themselves from being seen to be doing so.’

  ‘I’ll go with him,’ the armoured figure said casually, though his focus still seemed to be elsewhere. ‘It’ll be fun.’ Harper turned to look at the bizarre but obviously powerful individual.

  ‘Dane, we’ll need you in the final assault.’ Major Winterman said.

  ‘S’cool, man. You got a boat you can loan me?’ Dane asked a surprised Harper.

  ‘Er… yes, an IRC.’

  ‘I’ll watch the rockets, it’ll be like the Fourth of July, man. Really pretty. Then make the rendezvous with my man Chino.’ He nodded towards the Hispanic soldier, who nodded back smiling at the armoured figure.

  ‘It’s your decision, Major,’ Rasch said. The Major gave it more thought but then nodded to Chino. Chino took a laminated map out of one of his fatigue pockets and gave it to Harper. It was a map of New York with grid references and co-ordinates on the back.

  ‘Our biggest problem, captain, is a series of automated and manned gun emplacements. They have near total coverage and can deny us movement on street level,’ the Major told him.

  ‘What about moving underground?’ Harper asked as he studied the co-ordinates.

  ‘Much of the city is still flooded, much of the underground may still be extensively damaged due to Ceph action, and we can’t know what changes CELL have made beneath the streets. If the Robin Hood takes these gun emplacements out you will save a lot of my people.’

  ‘The spirits of dead warriors will look on you and know you to be righteous,’ Dane said. Fry was staring at the armoured figure and then started to laugh.

  ‘Don’t worry about my man Lazy Dane none,’ Chino said. ‘He’s just been living in that suit a little too long. It’s cooked his head.’

  ‘My righteousness aside, how good’s this intel?’

  ‘Swift, silent, deadly, ese. Forward observation a speciality,’ Chino said proudly.

  ‘Yes, well I understood what some of that meant.’

  ‘The intel’s solid, captain,’ Major Winterman assured him.

  ‘When?’

  ‘Zero five hundred eastern standard,’ Winterman told him. It was the same time that Cell had ordered him to fire on Yonkers. He had four hours to get back to the Robin Hood and prepare.

  ‘It’s been a long time since a British ship has fired on an American city,’ Harper said.

  ‘1814. The War of Neutrality,’ Major Winterman supplied.

  ‘It’s alright man, we’re on your side this time,’ Chino told him.

  Captain Harper was sure that the battered Bulldog light transport vehicle was older than Private Fry and maybe Corporal Fenn as well. With a four-wheel drive and Lazy Dane, who could apparently see in the dark, at the wheel they made much better, if more frightening, time back.

  The only thing that the large armoured warrior had said on the return drive was to ask if they could “see them all”. It had both the marines searching the surrounding area with their weapons at the ready until they had realised that Lazy Dane was seeing things they weren’t. None of them had any idea what the strange figure had meant and not even Fry had wanted to enquire further.

  The coxswain had moved into good cover and didn’t come out until he was sure that it was the Captain and the two marines returning. The boat pilot was nervous of the massive armoured warrior but said nothing.

  Harper typed the co-ordinates that he had memorized into the GPS device as they made their way across the black waters of the East River. There was just the slightest glow on the eastern horizon now. Fry was manning the MMG again. Fenn was looking all around, her SCAR at the ready. Dane was sat in the centre of the boat, his legs crossed.

  Harper looked up. There was a ripping noise. His brain registered lights coming towards him. Something hit him hard. He was in the water. Panic. He could see the water churning close to him, darts of phosphorescent light shooting through it. Someone grabbed him and dragged him to the surface. He gasped air into grateful lungs. There was more of the ripping noise. The boat was gone. It had ceased to exist, along with Private Fry, Corporal Fenn and the coxswain, who Harper was pretty sure had been called Harman. The water was churning again as tracers hit it from the Phalanx 20mm rotary cannon.

  He could see the muzzle flash. It looked like a constant flickering illuminating the darkness. The muzzle flash was refracting strangely with the Robin Hood’s cloak, distorting it. The ship had moved. Not far, just enough to have had them heading towards the wrong place.

  ‘Hold your breath, man,’ Dane was next to him in the water. The armoured soldier must have knocked him out of the boat. ‘I’m going to have to drag you.’

  Harper had enough time to take a mouthful of air before he was pulled under the cold, cold water. He mastered the panic of submersion, the helplessness as he was dragged along at a surprising speed. Then panic again as he realised that Lazy Dane was swimming towards the Robin Hood, not towards the riverbank. Then panic as his chest started to hurt and he desperately needed to breathe. Can the suit breathe under water? his frightened mind thought. He was sure that Dane was going to forget about his dependency on oxygen.

  ‘Breathe, hyperventilate, saturate your system with oxygen and then a final deep breath,’ Dane told him. It took a moment for Harper to understand that he was on the surface again and interpret Dane’s instructions. Then they were under again.

  Hyperventilating shouldn’t be a problem was the most lucid thought he managed, but even that was tinged with more than a hint of hysteria.

  He had no idea how long it took. It seemed like he was underwater for an age, the cold trying to rob his precious breath, and that he was only on the surface for moments. Everything was black under the water except the occasional flickering light above them. Harper’s fatigued and frightened mind finally managed to work out that the light was the Phalanx firing again.

  Somehow they were under the Robin Hood. He was at the surface. Gasping air into lungs that didn’t feel like they were inflating properly. His heart felt funny in his chest. There were ratings in the boat bay. Harper knew their names but couldn’t bring them to mind. They were armed. They were shouting something at him and pointing weapons. Harper was struggling to work out what was going on. One of them had a red beam of light coming out of his chest area. The red beam went away and two red holes appeared in the rating’s chest and he tumbled into the water. The other rating was turning, raising his
weapon, and pointing it at Harper.

  At your captain! an outraged and barely rational part of Harper thought. The top of the rating’s head came off and he fell into the water as well.

  Harper turned and saw Dane, still in the water, the big automatic in his hand, a suppressor attached to its barrel.

  He’s killing my men, Harper thought. Dane seemed to surge out of the water and grab hold of the ladder leading up to the raised boat bay. There was flickering light from the boat bay and Harper could see bullet impacts against the hull of his ship. The armour that Dane was wearing changed somehow. It started to look more like overlapping plates. The armour was lit up with sparks as multiple impacts knocked Dane around, but he continued climbing the ladder. The hatch to the boat bay was closing.

  You can’t assault the ship on your own, Harper thought, there’s Royal Marines on board!

  Dane, still taking fire, leapt off the ladder and grabbed the edge of the boat bay hatch as it was sliding shut and pulled himself up. The hatch closed.

  Harper realised that he was shaking badly and still struggling to keep his breath. He knew that he needed to get out of the water or he was going to die. He struck out towards the ladder below the boat bay hatch. It was only then he realised just how strong a current there was in the East River. Harper had always prided himself on keeping in good shape. He had never felt his age so singularly as he did during that long, long swim.

  His hand grabbed the lowest rung of the ladder. He found that he did not have the strength to pull himself out of the water.

  Is that it? he demanded of himself, you get this far and you quit? He remembered the pathetic mess he’d been in the wake of the London Emergency. The excuses and lies he’d told Rachel. Is that who you are again? Are you just going to lapse into self-pity and letting people down again?

  It took everything he had to pull himself out of the water. Then again as he pulled himself up to the next rung. Then again, but it was getting easier. The hatch above him started to open. The shadow of a figure stood in the warm light of the boat bay. Harper just kept climbing.

  ‘I’ve got you, Captain,’ Dane said and all but picked Harper up and deposited him on the floor of the boat bay. Harper saw more dead sailors, at least six more, men and women. He scrambled backwards across the floor, away from the armoured figure. Harper frantically tried to drag something out of the pocket of his sodden coat. Eventually he managed to free the wet Browning Hi-Power automatic pistol and, shaking like a leaf, he pointed it a confused Dane.