by Rick Partlow
“There’s no need to chamber a round with these weapons. They strip the rounds from the drum magazine magnetically when you pull the trigger. Center the aiming reticle in your helmet’s HUD on your target. Be sure you’re firing at the target in your lane.”
The targets were decades-old, junked Bradley armored personnel carriers filled with sand just to make sure the rounds stopped right there. They were five hundred meters out, far enough to keep it from being a point-blank shot but close enough no one should be able to miss with the helmet targeting systems.
“If anyone is having trouble achieving a target lock with the reticle, put your weapon down and raise your hand.”
One person did. It was inevitable. Someone always did. Jambo rolled his eyes and went to advise the private in question quietly, going so far as to put the man’s hands in the right position on the stock before he walked back to just behind the firing line.
“With your right thumb, switch the safety off. Your weapons should already be set to semiautomatic. If they are not, you will see the notification in your HUD.”
Jambo had the rangemaster voice down pat, bringing back fond memories of Parris Island.
“Are we ready on the left?” He peered down the line of shooters to his left. “The left is ready! Are we ready on the right?” His head swung around the other direction. “The right is ready! Shooters, the range is hot! Commence semiautomatic fire!”
It took a moment. Everyone wanted to make sure they didn’t screw up the very first firing of the M900, not knowing that Jambo and I had taken that honor ourselves weeks ago. The first round came from a private, of course. The discharge of the M900 was a sound like nothing else, a whining snap combined with the crack of the round burning an ionized hole through the atmosphere and the thunder of the air filling the evacuated hole. It was as close as I would ever come to hearing the sound of a real blaster from a science fiction movie and I was sure it would never get old.
“Solid hit there, Private Meinke,” Jambo said.
It was. I’d zoomed in on the old Bradley with the helmet’s optics and the puff of smoke coming off its turret armor was clearly visible.
As if Jambo’s words had been a signal, the rest of the platoon opened fire and the unique sound of the individual KE guns somehow blended into the rolling crackle of every firing line at every range I’d ever visited in all my years in the Marines. The impacts were distant, metallic bangs, nothing I could have heard singly, but together a handbell choir practicing, the next valley over.
I checked the IFF screen and found Corporal Quinn at the left end of the formation. The gravel crunched under the soles of my boots as I strode down behind his position and crouched. His form was excellent for someone using both the armor and the rifle for the first time, and every round he fired was hitting the retired Bradley, center mass.
“Cease fire, cease fire, cease fire!” Jambo bellowed. “Shooters, safeties on! Now, using your manual switches, adjust your rifle’s rate of fire to maximum ROF.”
This was going to be fun. It was riding my first bike, kissing my first girl, and jumping out of an airplane for the first time all rolled into one, and now that I’d had my chance, it was nearly as fun to watch someone else. Quinn examined the rifle controls carefully for a moment before turning the knob to the far right, then settled the buttstock against his armored shoulder again.
“Pull the rifle in tight,” I advised on the general communications net. “That muzzle’s going to try to climb on you and if you let it climb too high, you’re going to send rounds downrange about five kilometers.”
“Shooters!” Jambo called again after giving them about ten seconds to manipulate the controls. “Are we ready on the right? The right is ready. Are we ready on the left? The left is ready. Shooters, the range is hot! Safeties off and commence firing!”
If the M900 fired on single shot was a sci-fi movie blaster, the weapon on full auto was a summer thunderstorm captured in a bottle. The noise from the line of shooters was incredible, deafening even through the sound baffles of the Svalinn’s helmet, and the effects on the targets was nothing short of devastating. Quinn’s Bradley was being ripped apart like someone had taken a can opener to it, steel armor peeling away in sheets from the turret, sand drifting out of holes the size of a man’s head. The kid fired in controlled bursts, which was more restraint than I’d been able to show when they’d given me the chance, but he still emptied the drum in a matter of seconds.
He found the ejection control and popped the drum free, then switched on his safety and rolled off the weapon, grinning like a teenager who’d just lost his virginity.
“Sir,” he said to me, “I will go anywhere you want and fight whatever space monsters you throw me at, as long as I can have this gun.”
“Corporal Quinn, you are a man after my own heart.” I grinned, the expression feeling lopsided on my face. “Welcome to the fucking Space Rangers.”
Chapter Nine
The last time I’d seen Joon-Pah, he had been surrounded by his crew inside an alien starship, and his own strange appearance had blended in with all the rest of the strangeness. Sitting at the table of the White House Situation Room though, he very much looked like a man-sized koala bear stuffed into human clothes, and I couldn’t stop staring at him until Jambo nudged me with an elbow.
“At least now I don’t feel like the most out of place guy in this room,” he told me, grinning.
“You never were as long as I was here,” I assured him.
At least we didn’t have half the brass in DC in this meeting the way they were at the last one. Olivera and Julie were there, the first time I’d seen them in the five months since our “only-the-good-die-young” injections. None of us had died, or grown a third eye or mutated into an alien monster yet, so I was still hopeful it had worked.
Gatlin was present, looking a bit haggard and overworked, and I wondered if he’d taken the anti-aging shot and would start looking younger in a few months, once his skin cells had replaced themselves with less decrepit copies. He’d said hello to me and Jambo but had otherwise been engaged in a long, technical and nearly incomprehensible conversation with Joon-Pah about gravimetic force vectors, whatever the hell those were.
Delia Strawbridge had shown up and greeted us all with a perfunctory nod, her eyes locked on a tablet. She kept tapping it with a stylus and making troubled faces at whatever it was showing her. If they’d invited Shaddick and Patel, it would have been a Selenium reunion, but I guess those two had more important things to do than meet with the President.
The only one here who wasn’t on the original crew was Colonel Brooks, who’d flown in with Jambo and me from Idaho. She hadn’t been any happier with the interruption in training than we had, but I suppose if you can’t trust your subordinates to handle things while you’re gone, you should have picked better ones in the first place.
We all sprang to our feet when he entered the room, the Secret Service agents with him staring long and hard at Joon-Pah like they expected a chest-burster to pop out of him and go lay eggs inside Crenshaw. Which, I guess, you know, wasn’t entirely unjustified as paranoia went, given that the President of the United States was in the same room with an alien.
With the President was the National Security Advisor Thomas Caldwell, who I’d expected, and the Honorable Sonia Harrell, the Speaker of the House, who I had not. I tried not to glare at the tall, bleached-blond woman with Face by Botox as we all seated ourselves again.
“Speaker Harrell wished to be part of our briefing today,” President Crenshaw explained, the strain in his smile showing he’d never quite mastered the art of political bullshit despite his current lofty position.
“If I’m supposed to keep approving these ridiculous budgets,” Harrell interjected in the snide, condescending New York City accent that always made me want to jam icepicks in my ear, “then I need to be briefed straight from the horse’s mouth.” She made a face with collagen-injected lips. “By all rights, Mist
er Joon-Pah here should be testifying before Congress—”
“I’m sure Captain Joon-Pah has better things to do with his time than putting on a dog and pony show here in DC,” Crenshaw said. “His people and the crews from Gatlin Aerospace have been working around the clock trying to complete the defenses—”
“This nation’s political process doesn’t stop just because aliens invade, Mr. President. And I might add that the way you’ve kept all this away from our long-time allies is simply shameful—”
“It isn’t me that’s keeping the Germans from stepping up and taking a role in this,” Crenshaw said, obviously losing patience with the opposition leader. “It’s their own political divisions. They were given the same chance as Britain and Australia and Japan—”
“And the brinksmanship you’ve been engaging in with China and Russia…”
I rubbed fingers against my temples and wished I was back in my Svalinn with a KE gun in my hand.
“We’re here for a briefing,” Crenshaw reminded the Speaker, stopping her intended diatribe. “Mr. Gatlin, the Speaker would like to know what progress your people have made with the orbital defense platforms and the dual-environment fighters Congress approved.”
“Things are going remarkably fast, sir,” Gatlin said, then added, perhaps a bit reluctantly, “Madame Speaker. The engineering crews Joon-Pah loaned us have been invaluable and we’re already processing ore from the automated Lunar mines in the orbital smelting facility. The first defense platform should be operational within six months, maximum, the next three months after that.” He shrugged. “You have to understand, these are fairly straightforward structures, launching platforms for anti-ship missiles with fusion warheads and remotely-controlled railgun mounts. The fighters are going to be a longer-term project, I’m afraid.” He spread his hands apologetically.
“It’s the materials, you understand. Orbital platforms can be made from raw nickel iron because we don’t have to fly them anywhere, but building a fighter that can fly in space and the atmosphere requires synthetics we haven’t even developed yet, carbon nanotube production on an industrial scale…”
“We are helping as best we can in this,” Joon-Pah said, and I swear to God I saw Harrel’s eyes bug out when he spoke, like she thought he’d been a movie prop or something until then. “However, building the production facilities for mass fabrication of the material will take nearly a year, and there is nothing we can do to advance this significantly.”
“Until then,” Gatlin declared, “all we have are the two armed shuttles we were able to put together from the spare parts the Helta had on the Truthseeker. Those are fully adapted for human pilots and crew and can be configured to carry either fifty Rangers in full armor or a load of cargo. Those should be enough for the mission.”
Again with people talking about the mission. I’d heard the words over and over the last few months, but no one could or would share any details. I was getting a bit pissed off. Operational security is a fine thing, but I’d say the guys training your front-line troops need to fucking know.
“I’m still not comfortable with the accelerated pilot training and the shortened safety testing,” Julie said, scowling, unfazed by Harrel’s presence. “We’re talking about flying these things in space under conditions we can’t even begin to imagine.”
“My own people have gone over the craft from top to bottom,” Joon-Pah assured her. “And we will have time for full flight tests en route. But we don’t know how long it will take the Tevynians to figure out where this system is. The ship chasing us wasn’t able to report back, but they must have a general idea what sector it was investigating. It could be a matter of months, or even weeks.”
“I’m afraid there’s no time for the usual military safety protocols, Captain Nieves,” Crenshaw told her. “Captain Joon-Pah is right. This mission has to proceed on schedule.” He speared Colonel Brooks with a look. “Colonel, are your Rangers ready for this?”
“Hoo-ah, sir!” Brooks responded, a bit stiffly. This was her first meeting with the President…her first time in DC, in fact, and I knew she wasn’t used to the politics. “They’ve all been checked out with the new armor and weapons and they’re ready to kick some ass!”
Jesus. Fucking Rangers. Bunch of hard-charging yahoos.
“And what say you to that, Major Clanton?” Crenshaw asked me. “Master Sergeant Bowie?”
“This stuff is nearly as new to us as it is to them, Mr. President,” I admitted. “But everything we’ve figured out to do with the Svalinn armor, Colonel Brooks’ Rangers can do it to the letter and by the book.”
“Of course,” Jambo put in, “Andy and I wrote the book, so…”
Crenshaw chuckled at that, though Harrel’s expression looked skeptical. Well, what expression could get through the frozen features.
“Sir,” I said, less reticent this time to speak up, half because the newness of it had worn off and half because I hated Harrel and wanted to piss her off by ignoring her, “I know everything has been hush-hush and need to know, but can I ask what the mission is that everyone keeps talking about?”
Crenshaw turned to Caldwell.
“Tommy?”
“Right,” Caldwell sighed. “I suppose it couldn’t hurt.” He looked around at Brooks, Jambo and me, confirming what I’d guessed about who had been kept in the dark. Before Caldwell had the chance to spill the beans, Botox Queen opened her mouth again.
“Would someone care to explain to me why a hack science fiction writer is in this room and taking part in a top-secret briefing?” She smiled at me with as much insincerity as a politician could muster. “No offense, Mr. Clanton.”
“That’s Major Clanton, Madame Speaker,” I reminded her with as much disdain as I could put into the words without being charged with insubordination.
“Major Clanton was part of the initial contact with the Helta,” Crenshaw reminded her. “He was on Mr. Gatlin’s translunar ship.”
“And it’s bad enough we’ve given Daniel Gatlin’s company a monopoly on the new technology the Helta have provided,” Harrel snapped, glaring at the man. Gatlin stroked his beard, clearly amused by the rant. “Why haven’t we thanked Major Clanton for his assistance, made him sign an NDA and then deposited him back on the set of his TV show in Hollywood?”
“It’s filmed in Canada,” I corrected her. “As I’m sure Captain Joon-Pah will corroborate, all alien planets look like Canada.”
“Excuse me interrupting,” Jambo said, in a tone that made it clear he wasn’t the least bit sorry, “but Andy here is one of two people, myself being the other, who tested every bit of equipment the new Ranger units are going to be using. He basically invented the tactics for the things. If we’re going operational with this unit, he needs to be involved.”
My ears were warm and I hoped to God my face wasn’t as red as it felt. For Jambo, that was basically a declaration of undying love.
Joon-Pah made a sound like a cat coughing up a hairball and everyone stared at him. I decided it had to be his equivalent of clearing his throat, or maybe his imitation of us doing it.
“Major Clanton was instrumental in coming up with a tactic to defeat the Tevynian ship,” he said. “Something none of the Helta would have thought of.”
“And something I wouldn’t have thought of, either,” Olivera admitted, “because I had no concept of the technologies we were dealing with. Clanton and science fiction writers like him have been imagining this sort of thing for decades. He may not know the physics, but he can visualize the concepts.”
“We’re living in a science fiction world now,” Julia put in. “Who better to advise us?”
“In the country of the blind,” Crenshaw said with a piratical smile, “the one-eyed man is king.” He nodded to Caldwell. “Proceed, Tom.”
Harrel looked as if she’d bitten down on something sour, which wasn’t too different from the way she always looked, but she said nothing.
“The First Extraplanetary Detachmen
t,” Caldwell said, “is being deployed for a scouting mission in the Truthseeker, accompanied by the refitted shuttles and commanded by Space Force Colonel Olivera. While production of the new weapons and aerospacecraft continues back here, along with training of the new troops, the detachment is going to one of the Helta’s core systems on a mission to secure some starships of our own.”
My heart was thumping wildly, a fire raging in my imagination, the sort of feeling I’d had when I was eight years old and reading the Robert Heinlein juveniles or watching the old Star Trek movies. Starships of our own. We were going to have fucking starships. While I was still alive to see it. It was enough to make me forget the war we were going to have to fight to get the stuff.
“If all goes well, and the arrangements I set in place before I left to seek you out come to fruition,” Joon-Pah said, “there should be no fewer than two and perhaps as many as three cruisers of the same class as the Truthseeker in the construction and repair docks in the Heshib systems asteroid belt, ready for us to commandeer.”
“Once we have the starships back in orbit,” Gatlin added, “we can begin refitting them with the new weapons systems we’ve added to the Truthseeker.”
“New weapons systems?” I repeated, intensely curious. What weapons systems could we come up with that were better than a fusion-powered particle accelerator?
“Yeah,” Olivera said, grinning. “That’s actually based on your little billiard ball strategy. Apparently, there are all sorts of things you can do with the drive field on one of these ships.”
“And me and Jam…Master Sergeant Bowie are going to continue training the troops back here?” I said. It was disappointing, but it made sense. The training had to be done if we were going to have enough troops to deploy on two or three starships of our own.
“I have another idea about that,” Olivera said, regarding the two of us thoughtfully. “Sergeant Bowie was pulled away from his own CAG team to train the new detachment, so I think it’s only fair to put him in charge of the Special Operations team on this mission. They’ll be equipped with the new Svalinn armor and KE guns, plus a few other goodies we’ve developed. And I think you, Major Clanton,” he jabbed a finger at me, “should accompany the mission attached to the special operations team as a technical advisor.”