by T. R. Harris
The cargo truck was driverless and automated and moved up the mountain at barely five miles per hour. Howell decided to take advantage of the free ride and prodded his men forward to catch up to the slow-moving vehicle. It was harder than it sounded, as the team scrambled after the vehicle with their heavy loads and against the steep incline. At one point, they dropped the jet-packs, hiding them at a spot down the mountain from the entrance to the fortress. They couldn’t use them until they got out of the complex anyway. The reduced weight allowed the ten men to reach the truck and scamper into the covered back.
No one inspected the vehicle as it entered the labyrinth, nor were there many guards on duty at this hour. The road passed inside the mountain, before following a corkscrew path to the higher elevations. The electric motors hummed loudly, and the few annoyed natives along the roadway ducked into side rooms to avoid the high-pitched wail.
Lance Corporal Jerry Nance spotted the problem first.
“Sir,” he whispered into his throat mic, although the sound of the truck’s straining motors drown out his voice only inches from his mouth. “The truck is about to enter the loading bay. There’s a bunch of natives ready to offload the cargo. We have about twenty seconds before they see us.”
“Understood,” said Capt. Howell. “Get ready to jump. There’s a doorway on the right leading to a corridor that parallels the ramp. Anton and Stan, you go through first and clear the area.”
The Humans had detailed schematics of the complex, left by the Antaere when they evacuated the planet following the first Human invasion. As a result, the team knew exactly where they were going.
The two lead Marines opened the unlocked door and slipped inside. Howell heard one short puff of suppressed rifle fire as he came to the opening. He entered and found a dead native in the hallway with Private First-Class Anton Semionova standing over him.
The rest of the men moved into the corridor. The loud hum of the cargo truck evened out and then quieted as it reached its destination. Howell silently thanked the robotic vehicle for the ride. It saved them a lot of energy and reduced their chance of being spotted. It even put them a little ahead of schedule. Now he deployed his men.
The artillery batteries were on this level, with a hundred-foot-high ceiling in the huge holding chamber. The laser array was in a similar cavern two hundred feet above.
The complex had plenty of elevators, but the team preferred the stairways. They had equipment to carry and with their numbers, they couldn’t all fit in one car. According to the layout, there was a stairwell at the end of the corridor that reached about two-thirds of the way to the laser room. A moderate-size chamber had been carved out of the granite at that point, with another straight set of stairs leading to an access door at the rear of the laser command center. It would be the perfect place for Arturo to begin his abbreviated Run.
Normally, a REV would run forward until his time ran out and he was Twilighted. But Garcia would be confined to the laser chamber for the duration. He would run, but probably in circles, killing everything that moved. And that presented a problem for the mission planners. Killing the operators would help, but most of the equipment would remain intact. Then depending on how fast the enemy could bring in replacements, the laser array could be up and running again before all the shuttles lifted. It became a mission priority to make sure the power generators at the rear of the room were destroyed, along with the operators.
In response, Arturo’s armament had been modified. Instead of consisting mainly of deadly M-93 mag-bullets—numbering over a thousand rounds per arm—he only had one barrel dedicated to the ’93s, and with a single hundred capacity magazine. The other three barrels were dedicated to C-18 grenades, twelve in each bucket, for a total of thirty-six. It was hoped that as the REV fired on the operators, the grenades would cause enough collateral damage to the surrounding equipment to knock out the lasers for a longer period. Not only that, but Arturo’s control collar had been subliminally chanting within his mind the word ‘generators’ for over four hours. It was hoped that once he was activated, the suggestion would cause him to place a couple of grenades directly into the power supply. This kind of subtle manipulation didn’t always work with an activated REV, but hopefully it would this time. If not, then the dozens of randomly exploding grenades would have to do the trick.
The team moved up the long stairway to the staging chamber below the laser array. They encountered only one other native along the way, who was dispatched without incident. At the base of the last stairway before the laser room, the team began to un-wrap Arturo’s armor and weapons.
Captain Howell positioned the REV at the base of the stairway, about a foot from the first step. Hopefully that would be close enough to prevent any distractions at the point of activation and Arturo would run forward, racing up the steps and crashing through the door at the top.
The team began to dress Arturo in his armor and armament. They were experts at the assembly, and quickly had him decked out in the multi-piece titanium shielding, with his weapons strapped to both arms and ammo pods attached.
By the time they were done, Arturo was hunched over, down on one knee and barely able to lift his head from the weight. He couldn’t stand up, even with the small residual amount of NT-4 in his system which made him stronger than the average man. The load was simply too great. This was a first for the young REV. Normally he would be placed inside the armor within an injection pod. The weight of his equipment had never been an issue before, and by the time it mattered, he was an activated REV and capable of handling the massive load.
This time he would remain in a kneeling position until the NT-4 was introduced—down on one knee with his arms and head resting on the other at a ninety-degree angle to the floor. Then his body would cascade—the word used to signify his transition from Human to REV. His muscles would harden and strengthen. His respiration would increase, as his blood pressure soared to nearly three hundred. His senses would heighten and his brain would begin operating at an accelerated pace. He would become completely consumed by the drug, although he would be oblivious to all that was happening to him. All he would know would be unresolved anger and hatred as his skin crawled with an electric tingling that would only make him angrier. Anyone and everything that got in his way would be the focus of his mindless rage. He would kill…and then keep killing until the Run was over.
Yet in Arturo’s case, the Run would never end. Instead, all the heat, pressure and accelerated levels in his body would continue to climb—beyond the Twilight point—until his blood boiled and his heart exploded. Such was the result of terminal cascading.
When the team was through with the REV, Captain Howell turned to his men, his forehead drawn with deep crevasses. “This is it, boys. It’s all up to Gunnery Sergeant Garcia now.”
Each of the men leaned forward and tapped balled fists against Arturo’s armor. The REV strained to turn his overburdened head to see the team. He gave up under the weight of his equipment. “Thanks,” was all he said.
Captain Howell nodded. “All right, everyone start down the mountain. I’ll catch up after the deed is done. Once the shooting starts they’ll be no need for restraint, so take out anyone you consider a threat. Get to the jet-packs. And don’t wait for me; the pick-up driver will be waiting on the other side of the river. The shuttles will begin lifting as soon as Arturo initiates his attack. Be sure you’re on one of them.”
There were no acknowledgement of his orders; this was the plan all along. Instead, the team moved away and down the longer stairway, leaving Captain Howell and Arturo Garcia alone at the base of the staircase.
“We might as well get this started, Captain,” Arturo moaned. “Not sure how much longer I can support this mess.”
“Roger that, gunny.”
“Wait!”
“What is it?”
Arturo sighed. “This is the last conscious thought I’ll have, captain. I just want to take a second.”
“Understood.�
�
After another deep sigh, Arturo was ready. “Okay…let’s get this over with. I just have to keep reminding myself that it’s all for a good cause.”
“A life-saving cause, gunny.”
Arturo grunted.
Howell took out a small case from his backpack. There was a vial of yellow liquid inside which he inserted into a feeder at the back of Arturo’s command collar. The cameras on the thin metallic ring were active—two facing front and two back—and had been since the mission began. General Larson and the others back at Site A had been watching the team’s progress since the beginning. Now they would be holding their breath, along with Captain Winston.
“Good luck, Arturo.”
“Thank you, sir. But you’re the ones who are going to need it more than me.”
Howell smirked. The REV was right. Howell’s night was far from over, while the gunnery sergeant had about fifteen minutes left in his, and with a certain end in sight. Howell couldn’t say the same about his prospects.
“Here we go,” said Howell. He pressed the control button—then stepped back and fell flat on the floor behind Arturo.
An activated REV has such heightened senses that he can detect movement even from behind. If Captain Howell had stood motionless behind Arturo, his breathing—even his heartbeat—could be heard. By lying on the floor, his presence was masked, at least for the split second it took Arturo to activate and begin his Run up the stairs. That was the plan; however, if Capt. Howell never showed up to rejoin his team, no one would be surprised. Such was the inherent risk that came with being part of a REV recovery crew.
A blood-curdling scream echoed throughout the rock-lined chamber. Howell had never been this close to the primal cry of a REV, and it affected him more than he expected. The scream usually occurred in the confines of the injection pod and heard only through comm lines, as the drug coursed through the REV’s body, creating such intense emotion that he had to cry out for relief. Even during maintenance dosages, the REV was injected and then Twilighted at essentially the same time, so no scream was ever heard. But now Howell shuddered. At that moment, the savage nature of the REVs became even more real to him. They were more animal than man, and here he was only two feet behind this supreme and mindless killer.
Even after Arturo rose to his feet and began bounding up the stairs, the Marine officer remained frozen on the floor. Only after the door at the top of the landing crashed inward and Arturo disappeared into a cacophony of gunfire, did Winston Howell get to his feet and hurry down the long stairway behind him. It was now a race against time.
“Sitrep?” Howell called out to his team over the comm link.
“Sir, we’re about halfway down the ramp on the way to the outside. Did you deliver the package?” asked Staff Sergeant Charlie Fox.
Alarms began to wail throughout the underground complex.
“That’s an affirmative, sergeant… obviously.”
“Damn, the walls just sprouted a shitload of the enemy!” Fox shouted. “About a dozen of them appeared through a side door. Excuse me, sir, but we have a firefight on our hands.”
“I’m on my way. I’ll try to cover you from behind.”
“Roger that, sir…and please hurry!”
3
The natives and their Antaere masters were expecting the Humans to attempt a breakout of their mountain hideaway. Two huge battle-cruisers were on the way from the outer rim of the system and would be at the planet sometime in the early morning. This set a deadline for when the attempt would be made. The forces of the Order would be ready. They had over a hundred personnel in the laser chamber, including thirty-five experienced Antaere gunners. The natives were there to keep the equipment running; they had never mastered the fine art of laser array operation.
What the Antaere weren’t expecting was a REV to come bursting into the rear of the chamber, smashing through a small access door and sending deadly depleted uranium shells and exploding projectiles into everyone who moved. And they all moved at the sight of the REV.
The Antaere were very familiar with REVs. For the past twenty years the crazed killing machines had been tearing through their defenses with impunity. Many never survived their missions, cut down by overwhelming return fire or explosives, while others couldn’t be recovered in time before they died of their own accord. But during all those attacks, the REV was expected. Nearly every mission began in space, with a launch from one of the Human’s battle carriers. The Antaere would track the progress of the entry pod, knowing that a REV was inside. What they didn’t know was the target, yet once that was determined, the Antaere and their native allies would prepare for the Human, and the follow-up troops they knew were coming.
Arturo was several feet beyond the doorway before the first grenade exploded. He was firing from both arms; M-93 rounds from his right, C-18 grenades from his left. He swept the room with his lethal bullets, following the panicked flight of the aliens, cutting down a dozen or more in the first few seconds of the battle. He went through the hundred M-93 rounds in less than a minute. The trigger controls on his weapons pack switched automatically from the M-93 to the C-18 bucket on his right arm. Arturo never let up on the trigger, but now, instead of being in automatic mode on the M-93, the rate of release for the grenades was less as the larger canisters cycled into the barrel. Although the REV was constantly fingering the trigger control, the charges were released only one every two seconds. All he was firing now were grenades, and it was definitely making an impression on those in the chamber, including Arturo.
A REV is trained to instinctively follow all movement, focusing on the largest component first. Yet as Arturo fired and rushed forward, he was being thrown back by the concussion of the explosions, some only twenty feet away. His armor was being shredded by the shrapnel of his grenades, and not from enemy fire.
Although both the natives and the Qwin in Site B were expecting action against the Humans as they emerged from their distant mountain retreat, only three of the Antaere in the laser room carried sidearms. These were the three senior officers present, and the weapons were more part of their uniform rather than having any intended purpose. No one in the chamber imagined they’d be facing a REV when they reported for duty that early morning.
The three-armed Antaere emptied their flash charges into the REV. With his armor already in tatters, he now relied on lightning quick reflexes to evade some of the bolts, but not all. He was taking hits, yet his activated body was resistant to most. Still, there was a toll being taken. Several times, Arturo was thrown to the ground by the blasts from his own grenades. On one such occasion, a deadly level-one plasma bolt streaked over his head, the fall undoubtedly saving his life. Instinctively, Arturo reacted to incoming fire and its source above all other considerations. The three Antaere officers were blown into bloody, unrecognizable chunks of flesh a moment later.
There was something happening within Arturo’s mind, a nagging itch that he had to scratch. He turned his attention to the rear of the chamber, and the three huge stacks of energy generators attached to the granite rock of the cavern. Anger flared at the sight of the grey dynamos, and Arturo laid four C-18 canisters into the offensive machines.
Secondary explosions threw the REV toward the control stations of the laser array at the opposite side of the room, where the three stubby turrets jutted out from the side of the mountain. Openings in the rock wall allowed access to the outside along each three-element barrel and aliens were rushing through them to escape the carnage inside the chamber. There was no place for them to go. The lasers were only twenty feet long, and the drop over the side two thousand feet down before their falling bodies would meet rock outcroppings. Still, many scampered out onto the turrets, before either losing their balance and falling, or being shoved over the side by their panicking companions.
Those still alive in the chamber were becoming fewer by the second. Arturo was reaching the twelve-minute mark for his open-ended Run, and he was down to only six grenades le
ft. Fortunately, there were very few targets remaining.
Arturo kept dropping to one knee every time he put weight on his left leg. He was aware of the injury—one of many—and yet he kept scanning for more targets. His helmet was almost destroyed, with only a small section over his right ear still clinging to his blood-covered head. His breast plate was gone as well, having absorbed more than its share of flash bolts and shrapnel before falling to the floor. His chest was perforated with rips and holes, with blood gushing out and coating the floor around him in a pool of slippery red liquid.
It was quiet in the chamber. The secondary explosions from the generators had ceased, and any aliens who had escaped to the turrets were lying two thousand feet below on blood-painted rocks. There had been some moans from the wounded in the room, but the devastation was so complete that they had all fallen silent by now.
Arturo’s strength was dropping as the blood loss continued. He slumped to the floor, rolled over and cast blood-shot, vacant eyes toward the chamber ceiling a hundred feet above. A thick cloud of gray smoke filled the void, swirling in a light breeze coming from the openings near the laser turrets. Of the three weapons, one barrel was tilted down at a radical angle, while the other two sat quiet, with no power to charge them or operators to aim.
Arturo’s eyes fluttered shut. His bodily functions were continuing to cascade. Despite the major loss of blood, the pressure was still increasing, and his internal temperature was nearing one hundred twenty. No one could survive such numbers, even with NT-4, and Arturo Garcia was no exception.