by H. T. Kofruk
The reproductive cycle of dranipedes had to be strictly controlled lest the males started killing each other to lay claim to females in the rutting season. Certain chemicals had to be mixed into their food to keep their hormones at bay. Adam’s dranipede, Abraham, was not yet fitted with scale armour and the beautifully polished intricate blue diamond patterns gleamed in the dull morning sun. He was bigger than Magdalena but slower. Being a male, he was also more dangerous and he thrashed his head in delight at being set free and seeing his master.
“Let’s get these critters fitted and conditioned” said Adam.
Paul nodded. Adam used to be his mentor when he was an adolescent squire but Paul’s famous piety and combat prowess had earned him a higher rank. He was in fact one of the few knights of the Grey Order who had been honoured with the Seven Virtues of Knighthood, and the youngest ever to receive the honour. Ironically, Adam had been assigned under Paul during the war and Paul couldn’t have asked for a better tactical planning officer.
Six more dranipedes were reunited with their masters that day after three months of quarantine upon the Orthodox Alliance’s insistence. During that period, vaccines and immuno-pills were developed for the dranipedes, enabling them to roam Earth with minimal risk of contracting disease. Like the old knights of medieval Europe, the Grey Knights of Constantine were most effective in battle when mounted. The Saracens holed up in the mountain were probably thinking that the Grey Army was halting because they feared entering the tough terrain.
The remaining crates were opened to reveal the full combat gear to be fitted on the dranipedes. With the reinforcements, the next push would be even quicker and deadlier.
***
Nabil’s military Web-Com link indicated that movement was detected from the enemy camp. His visor zoomed in. A low, dark cloud hung over the enemy location, creating a shadow. Shafts of light penetrated through the ceiling of fluffy moisture, illuminating the rough, brown terrain. He couldn’t make out any specific movement.
An order sounded in his earpiece from the brigade headquarters. “Defensive positions. Enemy activity detected.” The enemy was merely forty kilometres away, a distance that could be covered within twenty minutes.
A bustle of activity occurred around Nabil. Camouflaged soldiers seemed to emerge from the ground, the trees and the rocks. Giant air-pressure manipulating units that could create small tornadoes in targeted areas were turned on just in case the enemy chose to use covering gas to hide their numbers and movements. Nabil knew that they wouldn’t; these Catholics enjoyed straight-forward attack. They used tactics that were only slightly modified from those used by pre-modern armies. He was reminded of a simulation of the Battle of Hattin, how the Christian knights came charging on their exhausted horses, wearing gleaming plate armour that could just as well kill them from the desert heat as protect them from the Muslim scimitars. The knights were gallant but foolish, so convinced of their cultural, religious and tactical superiority.
The war was still young but had already made veterans. Nabil’s company was made up of survivors of at least a dozen battles and skirmishes with the enemy. At the initial stages of the war, they had been overwhelmed at the ridiculous simplicity of the enemy onslaught. In a way, it captured the beauty of single-minded sense of purpose. Nabil swore that Mount Lebanon would be the last step taken by the Catholics.
After a few minutes of observation, the grey mass of weapons, armour and bodies emerged from the shadow of the great cloud into the sunlight. The camouflaged barrels of Peace Alliance pulse artillery emerged from the trees and crevices, ready to cause havoc in the enemy formation. Shock shield deployment units were turned on, creating whirring sounds as they pressurized. The status of the pulse mines, buried in the ground twenty kilometres from their position where they would slow down the enemy well in the effective range of the enemy, was checked and doubled checked by the artillery battalions.
Something puzzled Nabil. They were using vehicles that he had previously not seen before. Only a few of these long machines were visible but he could see they were heavily armed with kilo-class pulse cannons and what seemed to be two canister missiles mounted on each of them. He decided to zoom in to see what other weapons they were hiding and was shocked to see they were alien animals! He could see their large mandibles opening and closing threateningly. The Orthodox Empire was not only employing intelligent aliens to do their dirty work on Earth, but they were also guilty of using alien beasts. The thought disgusted him.
Battalion Command started distributing orders rapidly. Artillery firing range was adjusted and surface-to-air weapons scanned the sky for drone covering attacks. Bisimigen perimeters were reinforced and air and orbital support were summoned. Orbital support was denied, as was the case for the last month due to frequent skirmishes outside the atmosphere. Fortunately, a squadron of thirty fighters was on its way from the Golan Heights, ensuring some air support.
The squadron arrived a few minutes too late, however, and a swarm of enemy drones emerged from the northern skies. They were not accompanied by any fighters to guide them or validate targets but the sheer number of them was enough. Nabil’s visor counted three hundred drones, all armed with pulse cannons and short range missiles.
“Brace for drone attack!” he shouted to his company, somewhat unnecessarily since they had already taken covered positions. Each of them now knew that such precautions weren’t just for drills but were often all that separated them from pulse wave explosions. Nabil himself observed the enemy movements a few more minutes before having images fed to his visor from satellite imaging and the half dozen deployed hover-drones.
From his camouflaged bunker, he watched the enemy’s initial slow march gradually gain speed. All of a sudden, they lurched forward, travelling at well over a hundred miles per hour. He was mildly surprised to see how the beasts that resembled giant centipedes were not only keeping up with the amplifier-assisted armoured infantry, they were even pulling forward.
Sounds from outside the bunker told him that the enemy drones were attacking their position as ground-to-air missiles were launched to intercept them. Nabil approached the slit in the bisimigen wall of the bunker that looked out towards the advancing grey field. In merely five minutes, the enemy had managed to cover five clicks. They were rapidly approaching the mine fields. Artillery fire rained down on their ranks and launched shocks shields opened and closed like the mouths of hundreds of hungry vulture chicks. A shock wave went through the bunker, indicating a direct pulse cannon hit from one of the drones. A couple of the soldiers fell to ground, only to get back up dusting themselves.
The familiar sound of Cobra I fighters, imported from the Pacific Federation, was soon audible, as well as that of their Viper Mark 2 drones. Nabil looked back at the enemy lines and saw they had slowed down near the minefield, carefully using ground frequency emitters to create small earth quakes. He could see the sudden flashes of blue as underground mines went off, creating large craters in the sandy soil. The enemy also knew that not all mines would have exploded from the tremors but they had to take their chances; slow movement equalled vulnerability.
The distance between the front and last lines increased as the enemy spread out to avoid offering large targets. But that meant that they were less likely to be in the protection zone of the shock shields. ‘Fools’ thought Nabil. Their lack of tactical thinking was condemning them to a dilemma among death by mega-class pulse cannons, death by pulse mine or death by air attack. Dust was gathering as the blue-tinted explosions continued within and above the enemy formation. Nabil was almost sorry that most of them would not arrive at the mountains alive.
“We’re under attack!” shouted someone in his earpiece. Nabil was sure that he had misheard but then heard the same phrase repeated several times.
“By who?” he shouted back into the Web-Com. He looked back outside but could only see the slow-moving Catholics pinned down. A grating noise told him that the bunker seal was being opened. He instinc
tively swung his rifle in its direction, ready to shoot whoever or whatever came through. A single small object tumbled inside the bunker.
“Bomb!” he cried before grabbing a slab of bisimigen and smothering the pulse grenade with it. When it went off, he was thrown to the ceiling with such a force, he was almost sure all the bones in his body were broken.
His vision was blurred and objects were seen in twos or fours. An orange dot inside his visor continued to blink, indicating the shock was devastating but not critical. He lifted his visor and breathed in the air that smelled of ozone, immediately coughing after inhaling the vast amounts of dust. A thick liquid spouted from his mouth, making his chest and throat hurt. He was sure it was blood.
He groaned and banged his head with his gauntlet. A sickly smell came from somewhere but he had trouble seeing in the dust. Trying to get up, he put his hand in the liquid that had dropped from his mouth and was relieved to see it was vomit, not blood. He nodded his head to drop his visor and saw that the orange dot was blinking more slowly. The bisimigen slab had probably taken ninety per cent of the shock. Information in his visor display indicated that none of the other dozen soldiers in the bunker were dead though a couple were in critical condition.
As he slowly got up, he felt the shock had gone right through his bones, making him feel wobbly. His suit administered a shot of adrenalin on his thigh, making him come to his senses more quickly. The dust was settling and he could make out the bodies of his men struggling to get up.
“Is everybody okay?” he inquired. He already knew how they were but being forced to answer his question would bring the able ones back faster.
“Yes, sir” said a wobbly voice. Four more voices also followed.
The bunker seal opened once more but this time, Nabil didn’t have the strength to aim his rifle fast enough. Two figures entered the bunker, both of them clad in grey armour. They shot the two nearest and then at two more struggling to get up. Nabil lifted his rifle in agonizing slow motion and only managed to pull the trigger after they executed two more of his soldiers. When he finally did, he shot one in the face, shattering the visor and creating a hole the size of a grapefruit in the back of his head.
The other one immediately swung his rifle to Nabil who was still too slow in reacting. Luckily, one of his soldiers managed to fire his weapon before the grey soldier, sending him flying to the wall of the bunker. Nabil sighed heavily.
When he had recovered more fully, he ventured outside with three of his soldiers. He could see how the enemy had penetrated the defence; they had dropped from shuttles from the lower atmosphere. The monitors hadn’t shown anything because they weren’t programmed to detect anything as small as human bodies, especially if they weren’t carrying heavy machinery or electronic devices. They had slowed down using an ancient invention; parachutes. Hundreds of them were still falling. It was both ingenious and highly risky as a tactic since if the monitors had decided they were a threat, they would have been picked off with ease.
Nabil lifted his rifle and shot at the falling enemy. Hand to hand combat was already occurring with the enemy using grey swords. He then remembered the advancing bulk of the enemy forces and looked towards them. To his horror, they were already climbing the mountain slopes. Many of the artillery units had been sabotaged and destroyed. He calculated that they had ten minutes to take care of the enemy shock troops and then draw a defensive line against the advancing grey.
His estimation was wrong. A high pitched scream pierced the air from behind a large rock on the near slopes. A moment later he saw what had made such a diabolic sound; a giant centipede with murderous metal mandibles. The soldier riding on top of it had his hands on a pulse cannon and started shooting at what he considered worthy targets. Two more of the creatures appeared.
The three beasts seemed to almost slither along at great speeds and one took a trajectory directly to Nabil, its rider shooting elsewhere. Not really knowing whether shooting the rider would actually make the creatures less dangerous, he aimed his rifle at the grey figure. Before he could shoot however, a grey-clad soldier jumped from the roof of the bunker, waving a dull grey sword. Nabil saw the swift movement of the shadow and turned and blocked the deadly blow with the geratinium-reinforced underside of his rifle. The soldier swung again aiming for his neck only to be blocked one more time. This time Nabil attacked, using his rifle to beat back the soldier until his back was against the sloped bunker wall. The soldier swung again for his neck. Nabil ducked this time and came back up with the butt of his gun and hit enemy soldier squarely on the chin.
Though the soldier was wearing armour, he was left immobile from the impact for two seconds. Nabil threw down his rifle and grabbed the soldier’s sword arm with his gauntlet. From his other arm, three, foot-long geratinium edged blades suddenly emerged, humming as they vibrated more than a hundred times a second. He plunged the blades into the soldier, one into the cheek, one into the jaw and one into the neck. When he pried out the blades, the grey soldier dropped to the ground like a falling tower.
Nabil picked up his rifle again and looked for the beast and its rider. He didn’t have to look far, since the giant centipede was only thirty feet away from him and charging. He had to make a quick choice and either shoot the rider or the beast. The rider was no longer using the pulse cannons and instead had taken out his long sword, swinging it at the necks of dazed soldiers. He decided the rider was the primary target and lifted his rifle towards him, aiming for the head.
Something unusual happened in that instant. The rider’s long sword suddenly became liquid and then seemed to grow in length. The end was still pointed but the rest had become a twenty foot whip. Nabil knew he would be in range of that whip in two seconds and desperately pulled the trigger.
Everything happened too quickly. He found that all of a sudden, he couldn’t move. While his focus was on the rider, a tube had emerged from a gap in the centipede’s head armour and secreted a liquid that had shot out like a bullet at him. At first transparent, within a second it grew opaque and hard. He put his amplifiers on full strength and tried to budge but found himself glued to the spot, an immobile sitting duck. The rider kept on coming, waving his terrible whip.
Chapter 3: Dreams
‘Terraforming was always an activity fraught with risk. The success rate is below fifteen per cent and failure usually produces another wasteland planet. Terraforming is similar to the polluting practices of the twentieth century, creating vast junkyards that will one day catch up with us’ – Doctor Youssef Al-Seif, Renden Isolationist Activist, year 2871
The snow is perfect, fresh from the previous night. Up on the white Rocky Mountains, the world is only made of two colours: pure white of the snow and deep blue of the cloudless sky. The bio-rubber suit he is wearing underneath his clothes insulates his body perfectly while letting perspiration evaporate. The wind and the sun beat down on the exposed areas of his face as he bends forward to minimise drag. He is travelling at an exhilarating speed. It is funny that nobody else is on the slopes on such an ideal morning for ski junkies.
Nobody else save her. She is wearing a wine-red and white suit that compliments the contours of her athletic body. Even in the blur of speed, he drinks in the sight of her long legs, her smallish breasts, her perfect hips. She’s a more experienced skier than he, having spent every winter on the slopes since she was five compared to his starting at almost eighteen. He tries to catch up with her but becomes slightly anxious about going too fast and not being able to brake properly. She looks back at him mockingly, teasing him to go faster.
He takes the bait and bends even lower with his ski poles tucked underneath his arms. The drag diminishes even more and he can feel the acceleration. His viewing range shrinks to a small circle of focus, the rest of his vision are white lines. He sees her go beyond the poles that indicate the edge of the slope, into the unpacked snow among the white-clad pine trees. He follows her into the wooded area knowing that a wrong turn or the inability t
o brake at a precise moment could kill him.
Suddenly something feels wrong. They shouldn’t be here in such a dangerous area. He desperately tries to catch up with her but can only hear her soft laughter as she mocks his slowness. A low branch misses him by barely two inches and he just about manoeuvres himself around a log.
“Where are you?” he shouts but gets only laughter in return. “Heera!”
Just as he dodges another tree, she finally comes into view. He sighs from the relief and wants to call out to her to slow down, that he has lost the race. The tree seems to come from nowhere. It gave no indication that it was going to fall but it does, creaking as it slowly leans to one side. Heera is looking back at him with the same smile, her black ponytail lapping at her face. He wants to tell her to stop, to slow down but for some reason chokes. He can only watch as she is crushed by two tons of wood, bark and pine needles.
When he stops by her he kneels and lifts her head. Blood is pouring out of her mouth and nose. She looks up at the sky with vacant, unseeing eyes. Tears pour down his cheeks as he cradles her face and kisses her forehead. She is lost to him, again. Strangely it doesn’t feel like the first time. He lifts his head and curses God, asking him why he was being punished when all he ever did was in His name.
He looks back at her face and sees that her face is burning. Her pale skin seems to disintegrate into grey ashes. A blue fire burns from inside her, though he can’t feel any heat. He tries to stop the burning by rubbing snow into it in a desperate act to at least preserve her body so he could give her a proper burial. To no avail, however, and she continues to turn to ash, the flame evaporating the snow faster than he can rub it in. He cries out in despair, salty liquid covering his face. Before her eyes burn, they look at him one last time.
***
Terry gasped as if he were breaking the surface of water after almost drowning. He touched his face and found it wet. The dirty pillow he had used for three weeks was also moist. It was dark in the make-shift shack. He got up and wiped the moisture on his face with his sleeve that had now become almost grey and shiny from rubbing his runny nose. He put on the black heat-suit and walked outside with his head buried in the hood.