by Lee Bond
Such a fool, a damnable fool.
Ashok scanned his face in the mirror. He’d already lost weight; bad food and poor conditions led to a weak bowel syndrome that was the bane of a prisoner’s life. He wished for a razor so he could scrape off the straggly growth of hair covering his cheeks.
No matter. When Chairwoman Doans demanded to see him –and she would-, she was just going to have to put up with his condition. It wasn’t his fault he looked atrocious. No, that was all on Garth Nickels, the Living Antichrist. The Devil with Blue Eyes.
A guard showed up at the door. He tossed a pair of manacles through the bars, the shiny restraints clattering noisily across the ground. “Put those on, Traitor. Today you get to see some sunshine.”
Ashok grinned. His stock was rising already. Would he sell his brother out for freedom? No matter how helpful he proved, he knew Doans wouldn’t forgive him his excesses. A little bit of effort, though, and he might finagle a few liberties. Sunshine. Proper food. Toilet paper. Fresh air once a week. Small things.
xxx
Vasily accepted the news report with a barely audible grunt. Ashok Guillfoyle was on his way to talk with the Chairwoman.
Military avatars should’ve made the connection at the very beginning of the engagement. There wasn’t enough difference between ‘Gualf’ and ‘Guillfoyle’ to confuse the analytical programs. Technical teams were working double time to find out how their programs had missed such a blatantly obvious connection. Nevertheless, find it they had, and no one was wasting any time. Even if those same avatars were ascribing a measly five percent chance towards the men's relationship to one another, they were digging through government records at speed.
It was a very long shot, but the Chairwoman hoped that Ashok would provide her with more effective bargaining tools. Failing that, Alyssa would accept anything that might help them end the occupation without drastic loss of life. Naturally, a guest of The Peak and a Penitent of the Tongue would seek to offer anything and everything they could. It was just a matter of placing the proper values to what landed on the table.
If that failed, well, they had themselves their very own hostage.
Personally, Vasily believed Ashok’s usefulness would turn out to be either completely useless or greatly minimal. The level of planning for this particular day … no one in their right mind would let that go because of a sibling. Political extremists held to no particular family, not once they’d crossed the waters into this sort of country. Their agenda was their family.
Still, a part of him hoped Alyssa’s efforts yielded fruit.
Gazing through field glasses towards the temporary staging area, Vasily absentmindedly licking his teeth. Handed out in seemingly unlimited quantities, the coffee he kept drinking by the gallon was irritating his stomach and his teeth felt fuzzy.
Vasily snorted. History books never mentioned anything about how the glorious OverCommander Docket Trames had felt when confronting the murderous hordes of God-fearing fanatics on Delta-Seti-19, but Vasily had read the man’s personal journals. One of their greatest military commanders had suffered diarrhea throughout the entire engagement as well as a nearly debilitating crush on a female Onesie. Just as no one knew that about Trames, Vasily hoped no one knew he was dying to brush his teeth. It diminished the grandeur of the post considerably.
Across the way, a team of nervous-looking Technical Specialists was attaching bulky jump packs to a dozen God soldiers. They had every right to be worried; Goddies and jump packs were a volatile mix, especially since Onesies got incrementally more paranoid the longer they couldn’t see what was going on behind them.
Conditional training at its finest. Already, five of the twelve were nervously turning around in circles, forcing the Techs to work feverishly at securing the packs, skipping lightly and speedily in wide circles around their task. If the behemoths started to truly panic, it was possible the controls would misfire, thereby launching the Goddie in who-knew-which direction.
That was why there were always twelve or more soldiers for an action like this. Ordinarily a dozen God soldiers for something simple as a drop-in was overkill, but they’d learned to supplement the roster for when one or more of the legendarily dim-witted soldiers went skyward ahead of schedule or before the launch vectors were programmed in.
As OverCommander of the Latelian God Army, Vasily was supposed to find such moments deplorable. Truthfully, he felt quite the opposite. Watching his men involuntarily launched into space with utterly dumbfounded looks on their ogrish faces was of great amusement, moreso when they were inevitably tracked to their crash sites. If they weren’t killed by the lengthy fall or dead from collision with aerial craft, oftentimes the big lummoxes were discovered crying their eyes out, terrified they were going to get in trouble.
Through the binoculars, Vasily saw the commanding Tech Specialist turn towards the command post. Miracles of miracles, not a single Goddie erupted upwards in a burst of fire and smoke.
“Sa, last soldier is being buckled in now!” Behind the Techie, the final God soldier had his pack righted and locked into place. The twenty Tech Specialists vamoosed in a flurry of very light green uniforms, leaving the God soldiers to stand there looking bored.
“Excellent work, soldier.” Vasily meant it; the last time the packs had been used in a training exercise, they’d lost one Goddie at the bottom of a lake and one from a collision with a troop transport carrier flying at Mach 4. “Make haste to your command station. Keep me updated on equipment conditions.”
“Yessa.”
Vasily watched the lanky Technical Specialist leg it for his own, much smaller command post before turning his attention to the single unlucky Twoesie being dropped in with the rest of the Onesies. From his vantage point, Vasily saw the Twoesie react to the internal prote call with a brief flinch.
“Sergeant … Gruuk. Deploy your men closer to The Museum. Coordinate your jump sequence with aerial reconnaissance drones for maximal impact. Try to make sure that when you’re in there, you only shoot the people with guns.”
Gruuk saluted even though the orders were troubling. He wisely kept his worries to himself for the moment, brow wrinkling as he ran the parameters through his mind one last time.
As he understood it, the terrorists were dressed like people, only they carried weapons. If they dropped those weapons, did that make them civilians? What if a civilian picked up a gun and started shooting at the terrorists? Did that make them new terrorists? It was a nearly impossible riddle.
The Threesie in charge of the unit had done his best in explaining what was what for five whole minutes, but Gruuk didn’t think it’d stuck right in his brain. He was just going to have to hope that none of the terrorists put their guns down or that frightened civilians didn’t do the opposite. As a Twoesie, he was just smart enough to realize he was only smarter than a Onesie, and not by very much at that. If the rest of his crew went nuts, he was probably going to do the same. He grunted an order to the rest of his men and they boomed on over closer to The Museum.
As the dirty dozen got closer to their objective, Intel from aerial recon drones began downloading directly into the Twoesie’s brain. Gruuk started cross-referencing the material he was receiving with data already prepped by the Threesie.
The conclusion was an easy one; the majority of terrorist forces were still in the center area of the Room, no doubt keeping an iron fist on their prisoners. The locations of every armed man and woman flowed through Gruuk and into the Onesies, who shifted from foot to foot as the data became something they’d ‘always’ known.
The Twoesie grunted. The overhead drones were giving him a bit of good news. The leader of the group was still running around in his Trinity armor, making him easy to identify. Unless the bastard could change into something even more protective in three seconds or less, he’d be dead before his troops hit the ground. It was hard to protect your head from scorching hot laser beams raining down on you from on high.
Gruuk grunted
another order in the monosyllabic command structure of the Onesie battle language.
Twelve soldiers thwacked big red buttons over their chests –a concession to form rather than function as the devices were controlled directly by their cybernetic implants- and they launched into the sky.
xxx
Everyone in The Museum heard the thunderous approach of the packs and turned their heads expectantly skyward. Garth -leaning behind a column two feet from the entrance that would take him quickest to Naoko’s side- cursed.
From his vantage point, he could easily make out most of the Viewing Room. The change of events weren't exactly pleasing. Seeing for himself just how well-prepared Vilmos Gualf truly was to defend the Regime against the nascent democracy was disheartening. In retaliation, the OverCommander was launching drop troops.
Right into a filanet mesh. The play was right out of a standard Trinity tactic playbook, so no Latelian would rightly know about or even concern themselves with should they somehow magically be aware of the defensive array, so there was no need to prepare for it.
“Close your eyes, Naoko, honey.” Garth whispered as quietly as he could.
From his position, Naoko’s big orange foamy hat was just barely visible. He saw her head move frantically from side to side as she tried to spot him, but eventually, she stopped trying.
He whispered plaintively. “Please. You … you won’t ever be able to unsee what’s coming.”
The orange foam hat bobbled and then changed position. She was staring at her feet.
Garth sighed, licked his lips and started moving slowly.
xxx
Watching the feeds from the cambots just long enough to ensure that the Goddies weren’t pulling a fast one, Vilmos suppressed a shout of joy, reminding himself to be cautious.
After all, they weren’t out of the woods yet. In fact, they were dead center of the forest still, surrounded on all sides by an impenetrable wall of trees. This was but the first step. Personally, he was pleased they’d managed to hold on this long, what with the unanticipated ferocity of the explosions shutting them inside.
Still, when the incoming Goddies hit the go/no-go point of their vector, he happily ordered his men to scatter out into the crowds. The moment the soldiers crashed through the thick glass dome, their ‘command station’ was going to become the center of a very destructive storm of razor-sharp filaments. Shortly after that, the rain of bloody human body parts and cleanly cut cybernetic implants was going to leave quite a mess.
Everyone, including the recent inductees into their short careers as terrorists, scrambled to safety. Vilmos moved himself out of the way, choosing a seat in an unpopulated area of the Viewing Room and waited for the spectacle to begin.
xxx
Chadsik moved back a few seats. He didn’t fancy the notion of being splattered with someone’s guts, not unless he was being the one doing the splattering. He’d seen a few God soldiers up close and personal, and it struck him that they had more than their fair share of internal organs. The dispersal pattern was going to be much wider, much grosser than even their noble host expected.
As a matter of professional courtesy, Chad approved Vilmos’ decision to send his troops into the crowd. If -and it was a very big, very tremulous if- a God soldier or two survived the filanet to land in the middle of the room, it would be difficult in the extreme for them to differentiate between targets and civilians.
More to the point, the theoretically plausible God soldier would –upon seeing the detritus that’d once been his pack of gormless buddies surrounding him on all sides like an organic, bloody carpet- begin to rage, opening fire and mowing everyone down.
Chad really hoped that happened. The Voice howled in his ear, so he punched himself good and proper in the side of the head.
Deafening silence. Good.
Some things were meant to be appreciated, damn you.
xxx
For a wonder, they’d all landed safely on the glass dome of The Museum without crashing through. Analytical avatars hadn’t been able to come up with any better odds than 50-50 on that particular facet, and Gruuk was pleased as Punch he and his men hadn’t gone crashing through; that sometimes happened and it always threw a monkey wrench into the works. These Onesies were particularly tough, but even they would’ve taken injuries going through such thick glass.
Packs still humming with power –they were on low, slow ‘burn’ right now so that when the glass broke in a few seconds, they wouldn’t plummet right away-, Gruuk and his men drew their new-issue laser guns and sent down an expert barrage of fire, skillfully blowing out the middle of the big glass window. A thunderous cracking, groaning and altogether apocalyptic racket filled their senses as the heavy window shattered into huge chunks of lethal glass.
The more skillful soldiers under his command sent a second rapid barrage of shots towards the biggest chunks, masterfully shattering them into pieces small enough to break up into much safer bits once they hit the ground. Safety on the ground more or less assured, Gruuk shouted. The squad slapped the big red button to cut the power to their packs.
This was his favorite part. A big drop, a big, loud landing, them rising up out of the dust and the smoke and sometimes even fire … action like that terrified the opposition.
It was a good day to be a God soldier, yes it was.
xxx
The moment the domed ceiling cracked open and began falling through the filanet, the sentries nearest Garth became completely involved in watching the drama unfold.
It didn’t mean much beyond a momentary advantage; disguised as Harry Bosch as he was, he was immediately and instantly recognizable as an outside threat. The brief distraction of raining body parts would only give him time to neutralize his Latelian targets. After that, it was the gun sentries, and they were a whole other story.
It was going to take a lot of precise timing, what he foolishly –oh, so foolishly- planned.
Preparing for the moment with a warrior’s instinct, he unlimbered the mace and started moving the moment the soldiers’ feet came into sight. Counting to three before moving, Garth smoothly cracked both sentries on the head in a single, sweeping motion, keenly aware that the gun nearest them would identify that as an act of aggression.
Sure enough, before the first of the terrorists hit the ground, head split open, two of the three articulated gun ports clickety-clacked out of their standard firing positions to take a bead on his forehead.
If they fired and detected no damage, they’d merely reposition their attacks until he fell down dead, so Garth froze. The gun ports trained on him twitched restlessly. The third gun port -driven by intelligent programs rivaling the best Latelian avatar- remained riveted on the Dome. Nothing happened. Yet.
Good. The ‘brain’ of the gun sentry was having a difficult time determining which of the two detected threats was actually worse, and was keeping the ‘assets’ of the other two gun ports on standby as the assessment of the invaders grew more complete.
All this was happening in a fraction of a second, yet to Garth, it was an eternity.
Time resumed. The Goddies hit the first few layers of mounted filanet. The two gun ports pointed at Garth jerked violently, moving swiftly to aim their deadly payloads at the plummeting body parts. Abruptly aware that the soldiers below them were somehow dying, Goddies in the second ‘wave’ of the sortie panicked and opened fire even as they fell, shooting blindly through the gaps of their feet.
Slaved to one another through wireless communication, all the gun sentries reached the same conclusion; this was a real, pertinent threat as defined precisely by their programming. They returned fire, filling the air with the harsh, abrasive sounds and the smell of gun smoke. Panicking triply, the few remaining Goddies tried to slapping their booster buttons and fire at the same time.
Garth took his moment. He ran for all he was worth towards Naoko, praying again –even though they’d have nightmares for the rest of their lives- that everyone kept their ey
es on the scene of horrific brutality.
He hated Vilmos in that instant. He’d seen a filanet emplacement like this once before and had no urge to behold the spectacle a second time. A single exposure to a torrent of bloody rain and body parts was enough to last a lifetime, thank you very much.
With God soldiers being twice the size –if not larger still- than your average Latelian, the … ‘rain’ was a hundred times worse.
Speeding past row after row of captive Latelians, Garth heard a low, keening moan fill the air. It was the sound of disgust, sheer, pervasive shock, and stark, bleak woe. If any of Museumgoers survived the day, they'd be mentally scarred for life.
Just as he made it to Naoko’s row, a high velocity sizzle cracked past his ear. Garth flung himself to the ground, but it was too late. The gun tower hadn’t forgotten the intruder alert; it’d simply lowered his threat rating until it'd removed the more crucial-seeming moment from its databanks. Perhaps if he’d remained standing still he could’ve ridden out the threat monitor, but that would’ve been contrary to his needs.
A bullet drilled its way through the shoulder of his left arm, slamming him bodily into the ground. An exasperated curse escaped his lips but he held to his course. Grimacing against the pain, Garth waited to see if the gun’s programming would send a few thousand more rounds into the stands. When nothing happened, he heaved a shaky sigh of relief.
Crawling on hands and knees towards Naoko, acutely aware that the storm of Goddie body parts was ending, Garth found himself fervently praying. His only hope lay in the sincere and fervent hope that the gun would purge its memory banks of acquired targets.
xxx
Gruuk, last in, had just enough time to lay down a barrage of laser fire before every gun sentry arrayed around the room cut him to ribbons.
xxx
Breathing heavily from the pain and struggling to not scream like a girl, Garth levered himself cautiously into his seat. His shot arm was feeling distinctly … abnormal … but there was no time to assess the damage. Not yet. First, he needed to see what else was going on, see how bad the damage with the Goddies was and to learn, if possible, what else Vilmos had in store.