by Isaac Hooke
“Then I’ll climb the wall,” she said.
“But that didn’t work out for you the last time…” he said.
She didn’t answer, but instead continued forward stubbornly. She was taking severe damage by then, with her ballistic shield becoming chewed down to a small circle, and Rade was worried for her safety. He did his best to target the aliens around her with his laser rifle, but he was rarely able to hit a vulnerable point anymore—those mandibles and tentacles were constantly swinging and switching directions. He was nearly pulled from the passenger seat a few times, and had to remove his seatbelt in order to shift around.
“Taya, are you sure you can climb this building?” he said.
Still no answer.
She finally arrived at the building. Surrounded by biting aliens, she reached behind her body with her left arm; her shield was so ravaged by then that her hand was completely exposed, allowing her to wrap her fingers around his shoulders.
“Taya, what—?” he began.
She hauled him upward, throwing him into the air. He rose four stories, to the open window where Bender had fired the RPG.
Bender’s arms flung outside and wrapped around his torso.
“I got you, Chief,” Bender said.
Rade struggled against him. “Let me go! Taya…”
Bender ignored him and pulled him into the room.
“Taya, climb!” he said, finally breaking free of Bender.
Rade peered out the window. He saw her valiantly attempting to climb the building exterior, but the aliens kept pulling her down. Those ax-like feet chopped terribly into her back. Feed valves were severed, and servomotors bashed.
“Detonate the charges you placed!” Taya said.
“No!” he told her. He fired his weapon indiscriminately into the alien throng below. “Not without you! You’re still in the collapse zone. I don’t want to lose you again.”
“Do it!” she transmitted.
“I can’t,” he said. “I—” he hesitated. “I love you.”
Her avatar smiled fondly.
“Thank you so much,” she said.
She had been trying to scale the wall once more, but after that transmission, she released it. This time, when she hit the ground, she didn’t attempt to climb. Instead, she simply fought against the Draactals that surrounded and overwhelmed her.
“Taya!” he said.
He pulled himself through the window, but Bender latched onto his arm. Rade turned around and punched his faceplate, causing cracks to appear in the glass. For a moment Rade was afraid he’d broken the plate, but according to his HUD, pressurization was stable.
“Chief,” Tahoe’s voice came over the comm. “Rade. Let her go. We’ve all gotten away from the collapse zone. Detonate the charges now, while you still can.”
Rade glanced down. Some of the aliens were beginning to scale the wall below, while the rest continued to ravage Taya.
“I… can’t do it,” Rade said. “Maybe her AI core can be salvaged.”
Taya finally fell beneath the relentless assault, and the aliens began ripping her apart.
“There’s nothing that will be salvaged from that,” Tahoe said. “You have to let her go.”
He knew his friend was right. He’d lost Taya again. A final time. His precious defective mech.
Tears streaming down his cheeks, Rade activated the remote detonators.
The explosions went off. To the west, the street beneath the aliens caved in, from south to north, though only a portion of the L-shaped collapse was visible from his current location, blocked by the skyscraper itself. Aliens were swallowed by the resultant sinkhole in waves.
To the north, the lower levels of the building on the far side of the street blew away, as did the bottommost portion of the building at the corner of the current intersection. Both buildings tilted precariously, with the northern building on a path to crush all the aliens that resided in the north-south street in front of it, while the closer building was collapsing at an angle that would pulverize most of the aliens directly below, and in the east-west street to the left. A terrible rumbling sound filled the air, consuming all else.
Rade lifted his laser rifle as those buildings collapsed. It wasn’t enough to see the aliens crushed. He wanted to personally dispatch as many of them as he could, and cause as much pain as possible, before they went down.
He fired at the aliens that were scaling the wall below, and targeted their vulnerable spots. He smiled grimly as each of them in turn let go of the wall, their bodies flailing about before they struck their brethren below.
He thought of Rex, Keelhaul, Taya, and all his other friends who had died, and the tears of rage poured down his cheeks as he unleashed hell.
And then the streets were covered in dust, and Rade couldn’t see a thing. If he didn’t have a jumpsuit, no doubt he would have been inhaling the small particles of concrete, glass and metal that composed that dust.
The rumbling continued for at least another thirty seconds, and then an eerie silence descended on the streets.
A few moments later distant howls filled the air, and Rade thought at first that the aliens were giving a cry of victory.
But then he realized there were too few of those cries.
And they were rapidly receding in volume.
The Draactals were fleeing.
The colonists were safe.
33
Rade stayed holed up in the building with Bender, because the dust made it impossible to see—these particular jumpsuits weren’t equipped with echolocation abilities. They activated their PASS distress beacons.
A few hours later, when the dust finally cleared, a fleet shuttle arrived to collect them.
The lieutenant commander was aboard. As were the recently collected Tahoe and Snakeoil.
“You made it,” Rade told Scotts.
The lieutenant commander nodded. “Alpha platoon put up a fine fight, but eventually the assault became too much. The aliens kept moving their dead out of the way, freeing up the stairwell, so I gave the order to detonate the demolition blocks we’d placed. We collapsed the stairwell, sure enough, but only ended up blocking ourselves into the hallway next to the airlock.
“We found out later that the aliens had dug through to the next flight, and continued deeper into the building. Luckily, some of the army troops on the other side of the city had managed to fight their way to the subway tunnels, and made their way to the central skyscraper. They were able to provide a second bottleneck as they met the aliens on the stairwell, and pushed them back, away from the other airlocks and the colonists within. Four more floors were lost, but the troops managed to keep the rest at bay. They were close to losing in the end, until you detonated all those other charges. It was your team’s bravery that caused the aliens to give up and flee. You destroyed about eighty percent of them.”
“You’re here in a fleet shuttle,” Rade said. “Does that mean the Nemesis have withdrawn?”
“It does,” the lieutenant commander said. “The Draactals retreated onto the plains, and the Nemesis are heading toward the closest Slipstream. They don’t need gates to traverse the wormholes apparently. Anyway, we’ve won here. For now.”
“Did any of the mechs make it?” Rade asked.
“Regretfully, no,” Scotts said, confirming what Taya had told him. “There was nothing left of the AI cores of the mechs that valiantly defended us on the sixty-seventh floor. I intend to recommend them for the Medal of Honor.”
“Won’t do them much good now.” Rade gazed at the rubble below his fourth-floor window. “I’d like a salvage team sent here.” He marked Taya’s last known position on his HUD. “I lost my mech here. I’d like the team to dig it up, if possible, and confirm whether the AI core is salvageable.”
“Of course,” Scotts said. “I’ll transmit the location to the necessary teams.”
“Did you find Cynthia among the colonists?” Rade said.
“Not yet,” Scotts said. “Th
ough I’m sure she’ll turn up eventually.”
Rade glanced at Bender. “Well, my brother, it’s time to go home.”
Rade napped the whole trip back to the supercarrier. When he arrived, he and the others went to sickbay, and received subdermal patches for the minor radiation poisoning they’d suffered during the battle. Then he went to his assigned berthing quarters—a solitary compartment thankfully—and promptly fell asleep.
When he got up, he showered, and then read the report the lieutenant commander had sent. Apparently, the salvage team had recovered Taya, but there was nothing left of her AI core. It was pulverized. Scotts indicated that Taya had no backup: it was lost when the Radial went down. She was truly gone.
He paused there for a long moment before reading the rest of the report.
Cynthia had been located among the colonists, and she’d been brought to the supercarrier. She was under guard in the guest quarters.
The Anarchist was not found in the debris of the Radial, nor among the dead after the Nemesis retreated, so the Brass concluded the entity escaped. The data gleaned from its AI core remained intact, shared as it was among the databases of the other starships. However much of it was encrypted, the data format unknown to man. The computer scientists were working on cracking it. Cynthia claimed to have no knowledge of the data formats.
Rade shared the news with Bender and TJ over the comm, and told them: “Maybe you should help out the computer scientists with that.”
“Shit man, we’re hackers, not crackers,” Bender said. “Leave the data interpretation crap to the fools who like staring at numbers all day.”
“It isn’t all that much different from what we do,” TJ said. “But I admit, it holds little interest to me. I need a vacation.”
“I hear you,” Rade said, tapping out.
Reinforcements arrived a few days later, and the fleet was being rotated back to Earth for a much-needed recovery period. During the two-week journey back, Rade found it difficult to deal with the loss of Taya and Rex. He’d recorded the necessary video message for Rex’s parents, explaining how their son had valiantly died saving a colony. He also recorded a message for Rex's wife, and older brother, which was more difficult. The LC offered to do it, but Rade felt it was his responsibility. He said this to Rex’s wife:
“I’m Rade Galaal. Your husband’s chief. I’m sorry to be the one to tell you this, and there’s no way I can dampen the shock of it, but he’s no longer with us. He gave his life, fighting for his brothers, helping to save Newridium when the aliens came.” Rade momentarily looked away, struggling to control himself. He reviewed what he wanted to say, repeatedly in his head, so that the words would be easier when he spoke them. Finally, he returned his attention to the recording camera. “He wanted me to tell you that he loved you and your daughter, more than anything in this universe. Even more than us, his brothers. You should know, he never gave up. He kept fighting to the very end. He was... the best of us. I know that’s a cliché, but in his case, it’s true. I’m so... I can’t tell you how much his death hurts. But who am I to talk? He was your… everything. Thank you for being there for him when he needed you most. I’m just sorry he won’t ever be able to be there for you again.”
He ended the message and sent it before he could change his mind. Then he closed his eyes and wept.
So yes, Rade was able to record something for Rex’s family, which helped instill a sense of closure, even if the pain was still there. But there was nothing for him to record for Taya. As an AI, she was born in a factory, and had no family. Things somehow seemed unfinished between them, so he tried to force himself to record a message anyway, but he simply sat there, at a loss for what to say. He ended up ripping his bunk from its frame, and bending the metal in the rage that followed.
A few days out from Earth he received a call from Tahoe. As usual, his friend had been minding his own business, giving Rade his space, so he knew he didn’t have to worry about Tahoe prying into his feelings. At least not for a while.
“What is it, brother?” Rade asked.
“I got, uh, an… issue that needs your attention,” Tahoe replied. “There’s kind of a problem.”
“What kind of problem?” Rade couldn’t suppress a sudden worry. What now?
“It’s Skullcracker,” Tahoe said.
“What happened?” Rade said.
“He’s in the viewing gallery,” Tahoe said. “He’s… he’s just sitting there. Hasn’t eaten since yesterday. Or even had a drink, according to the ship’s main AI. I tried getting him to eat, but he refused. He’s asking for you.”
“I’ll talk to him,” Rade said.
He stood up and made his way to the gallery. He found Skullcracker there, sitting cross-legged in a peaceful pose next to the windows that allowed one to gaze at the stars outside the ship. Those weren’t real windows of course, but rather viewscreens that piped in the feed from the external cameras. Modern starship design precluded any windows.
Rade studied his friend. There was a plate of chicken and rice on a tray in front of him.
Rade wasn’t sure he could talk to him. Wasn’t sure what to say. He was still reeling from the deaths of Taya and Rex. But he had to try. It was his duty. He would put on a brave face. Hide his pain. He had to be there for Skullcracker and the others.
He would bring his friend back from the depths.
But who would bring me back from the depths?
Rade ignored the thought, and sat down beside his friend. Skullcracker didn’t even bother to look at him.
Rade rested a hand on his shoulder. “Cyclone said you wanted to talk. Well, I’m here. Don’t give up. Come back to me, brother.”
Skullcracker still didn’t look at him, and instead continued to gaze at the viewscreen. “I forgot what happened for a while. But now that the fighting is over, I have nothing to distract me. Every spare moment, I just… she’s always there. I should have asked for leave. I should have quit. Something, anything. I should have known something was wrong. I…”
“Even if you had gone, there was nothing you could have done,” Rade said.
“Rex is gone now, too,” Skullcracker said. “And I don’t even care. I’m not sure I’d care if I lost more of my brothers, either. I’m just… so inured to death now. Expecting it to happen everywhere. To everyone. Waiting for it to take me.”
“Well, you have a long time to wait yet, my friend,” Rade said, echoing what he told Bender earlier. “I never told anyone this, but I was like you, after Alejandro died. The months after his death were the hardest. All I wanted to do was kill those responsible. And I did, for a while. It helped me forget. But as soon as the killing stopped, I went back to the remembering. And at that point, I just wanted to give up.”
“How did you get through it?” Skullcracker asked.
“Time,” Rade replied. “Time doesn’t heal the wounds, far from it. But you do stop constantly thinking about what happened, which helps. In fact, I began to make a conscious effort not to think about his death. And now, when his memory comes to me, I can still feel the pain, even after all these years, but when I focus on something else, it’s gone. The pain is… never going to go away. But that’s better, I think. It reminds us of how much those we lost meant to us.”
“But if I do that, forcing myself to stop thinking about her, she’ll just be forgotten,” Skullcracker said. “That thought hurts the most. I can’t allow that.”
“We’re all going to be forgotten in the end,” Rade said.
“Even you?” Skullcracker asked.
Rade nodded. “Even me. Especially me. When I’m gone, everyone who ever knew me will still think of me from time to time, a memory of a memory. But when they go, even that will be gone.”
“So, what’s the point of this?” Skullcracker said. “The point of existence?”
“You asked me before,” Rade said. “My answer hasn’t changed. There isn’t one. Other than to exist while you can.”
“I’m not
sure whether talking to you has helped, or made me feel more depressed,” Skullcracker said.
“Bro, as I told you before, life is a tragedy,” Rade said. “But there are also moments of unmatchable joy. It ebbs and flows. We can make a conscious effort to control our flight, but mostly we’re just passengers along for the ride.”
Skullcracker nodded. “Now that actually makes me feel a little better.” He paused, and finally looked at Rade. “I heard what you did when Taya fell. How you tried to go to your mech.”
When he heard her name, Rade flinched, and pulled his hand away from Skullcracker’s shoulder.
“Sorry,” Skullcracker told him. “That’s obviously a sore point. I shouldn’t have said anything.”
Rade didn’t answer for a long moment. He was staring at the stars now, too.
“I loved her, in the end,” Rade said.
“An AI?” Skullcracker asked.
Rade smiled patiently. “Yes. An AI.”
Skullcracker didn’t seem happy with that response, because he said: “Like a sister, you mean…”
“No, more,” Rade said. “I love Shaw, but I also love Taya. Or loved. I’m not sure how to explain it. I’m not sure I even understand it. She’s a machine. An AI, like you said. But I did love her. I’ve lost so many, but losing her ranks up there with the worst of them. Maybe the worst.”
“Then why do you seem so… composed,” Skullcracker said. “Looking at you, I don’t see a man bereaved.”
“Trust me, it’s all a facade,” Rade said. “A front I’m putting up for the benefit of you, and the men. As soon as I’m alone, I break down. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve cried in the past few days. Nor destroyed my quarters.”
Skullcracker nodded. “Somehow, that’s strangely reassuring. That I’m not the only one who’s lost someone important. I don’t know why that makes me feel better. That others should feel this terrible pain. I just… wish she was back.”
“We all wish that of those we’ve loved.” Rade stood to go. “Oh, by the way, when we get back to Earth, am I right in assuming you don’t plan to renew your commission?”