Nightfall

by Christian Kallias

  Seven down, thirteen foot soldiers to go. I redirect my ghost to run in the middle of the room in an attempt to divert the mech and the sentries. I re-engage my cloak and run toward the opposite side of the room, using my ghost’s diversion to pick off another three soldiers with well-placed blaster shots. Ten to go.

  I approach a couple of soldiers from behind, with them shooting at my ghost, and they never see me coming. I slit the first solder’s throat with another blade and use his body as a shield when the second one pivots and starts firing. I grab two smart shurikens from my belt, lock my target, and throw them toward the soldier. They split in midair and each land into one of his eyes. He screams louder than anyone I ever heard.

  But that brings unwanted attention to the area, so I have no choice but to shoot his head off with a round of concussive ammo from my heavy-duty blaster rifle. Some of the blood splashes on my face. I wipe it off as I pivot around in time to see a rocket coming straight at me. The mech figured out it had been firing at a holographic ghost, and now he’s going for the real thing.

  “Tanya, now!”

  Whatever smart-plexi was left standing in the entrance is obliterated as a barrage of laser fire and rockets fly in. I do the splits, and the mech’s rocket passes upward, detonating twenty meters behind me, smashing what was once a masterfully designed old-school waterfall. Its support structure, made of heavy green stone, is wiped out.

  By the time I’m back on my feet, three soldiers and a sentry are on their way toward me. I feel the itch to activate bullet-time, but I know it’s too soon. I have to keep it as a last resort, to make sure that no matter what surprise Ahmed has in store for me, I can get out of it by using it. But, boy, would it make this part a lot simpler if I could use it!

  I remind myself that I thrive under pressure, so I press on.

  Time to test the new appendage augments. I imagine a very long whip, and I make the throwing motion at the nearest incoming soldier. The augmented nano-liquid metal reacts to create what I have envisioned. Before the soldier can respond, the whip latches around him. With a mental push, I ask the whip to be as thin and sharp as a razor. What happens next is nothing short of gory. The soldier is cut in pieces like a shish kebab.

  A second approaching soldier manages to hit a couple of blaster shots to my left shoulder. My shield takes the hits and holds. I flail the whip toward that new target, thinking how good it would be to just cut him in half. Sure enough, the whip gets very strong and sharp upon impact, cutting the soldier in two around the waist.

  The next one is barreling toward me, shouting from the depths of his lungs, his face scorched by blaster fire, no doubt from the outside cover fire Tanya provided me. I retract the whip and use my other arm augments to cast three long claws that extend from my fist. I punch them through the incoming soldier’s stomach, effectively impaling him. I lift him off the ground, even though he’s still alive, as I’m sure that won’t be the case for much longer. I can see it in his eyes; he knows the end is near.

  That’s when things start to get tougher as the first sentry is nearly upon me. I throw the impaled soldier at it, hoping to make it trip, but that’s wishful thinking. It simply swats the body to the side with the super strength its mechanical body provides. The sentries might look human, but they’re entirely artificial, from their body parts to their very advanced AI onboard systems.

  An AI bred for war and combat. I know I have to be careful how I deal with these.

  When the sentry is upon me, it starts with a combo of right and left jabs. Sentries can and sometimes do use blaster weapons, but they’re so efficient at hand-to-hand combat they are rarely equipped with any additional arsenals. They’re killing machines either way. I manage to block the sentry’s first combo. It’s really fast, so I need to stay focused. Its armor is incredibly solid too so trying to damage it with my bare hands won’t do. Fortunately, this model doesn’t seem to have shields.

  I use the appendage augments to create a solid shield for my left forearm. I use it to deflect its attacks and retaliate with my right-arm repulsor weapon. I keep it at bay, but that’s not enough, and other targets hit me. My shields are holding, but they’re draining fast. I check my power levels. I’m still at one hundred and five percent, and soon I will have consumed the extra charge. On the top right corner of my HUD, a clock counts down. Only seventy-three minutes left; that is, if Ahmed keeps the same timetable as before, which we can’t be sure he will.

  “Status on the jamming field?” I ask Tanya as I keep trading blows with the sentry. I scorch its armor with my repulsor fire, but the damage is mostly cosmetic.

  “I’m still locating the source of the signal. I should have it within a minute or two.”

  There’s no way I’m gonna get rid of the sentry this way, so I change tactics. I grab my nano-blade and activate it. The sentry recognizes the threat, and it goes on the defensive instead of attacking me relentlessly as it did before. Their AIs are highly adaptive, and they have different tactics for each situation.

  I’m losing patience, and my shields are getting drained by enemy fire.

  Tanya is doing a great job at eradicating the rest of the soldier force with the drones and fighter, and soon there are only a couple of them behind cover. The rest are dead or dying on the hard, cold marble of the once beautifully pristine hall of the World Security Center. It’s now a graveyard of broken stones, body parts, and blood spread everywhere.

  When the second sentry starts converging toward my position, I know I’m in trouble. I need to find a way to dispatch them. An explosion nearby sends me flying into the air. The mech mostly occupied with running interference against my drones has finally decided to change its targeting priorities at the worse possible moment for me.

  I fire three repulsor blasts toward the ceiling while still in the air, creating a cave-in that sends large concrete debris atop the mech. It stumbles but stays upright. When I land, I’m greeted with the second sentry’s knee right in the face. That sends me skidding on the marble for several meters until a soldier’s dead body ends my course. My head is ringing, and I need to devise a better way to deal with them.

  Vassiliki’s image blinks into my HUD.

  “Don’t try to fight these sentries like normal soldiers; they look like humanoids, but they’re killing machines.”

  “Tell me something I don’t know,” I spit back in anger.

  “Use their considerable metal mass against them.”

  That’s a good idea. I packed a couple of magneton grenades. I’d rather not use both of them, so I use my liquid metal augment to create a long fighting stick. I keep them at bay by hitting them with fast, twirling hits that have enough momentum and reach to impact each of them long enough so I can switch between targets in the middle of my stick combos. They no longer manage to score any hits this way. I know they’ll adapt to my fighting patterns fast, so I need to end this dance.

  My HUD flashes red to indicate a missile lock from the mech and is about to release one or more missiles toward my position. I don’t want to be here when that happens; with my shields almost gone, this could get really messy. I mentally call one of the drones to make a flyby on my position. For this to work, timing must be perfect.

  I retract the fighting stick and fire all of my repulsors at the sentries. It hits them in the torso and shoulder respectively but doesn’t do much damage, though it does make them react, and they both sprint toward me. I grab a magneton grenade, activate it, and throw it in their path at the last moment.

  Any sooner and they might identify and dodge it; any later and they could hit me before it detonates. I can feel Tanya’s help on that throw; she’s probably making a minute adjustment to my release-and-throw angle to obtain the absolute perfect result.

  The moment the grenade hits the ground and activates, I see the multiple flashes of the missile launches from the mech. This is going to be close. I use my super speed and my super strength to jump high into the air. The magneton field expan
ds almost instantly, and both sentries are quickly engulfed in the initial spherical shockwave bubble. When it starts retracting onto itself, a powerful magnetic field is intensified around the grenade’s range, and the sentries are sucked into one another.

  A fraction of a second later, the drone I called is flying by, so I grab onto it for dear life, and it pulls me away from what is coming next. The three missiles the mech fired earlier arrive at their destination, but rather than finding me, they find the interlocked and magnetically trapped sentries. The explosion sends metal parts flying all around.

  “That was quite ingenious,” says Tanya.

  I wish I could take credit for it, but if it hadn’t been for Vassiliki’s hint, I might not have thought of it.

  “Thanks,” I say, not bothering to acknowledge I might be getting outside help.

  Three hits of heavy blaster fire graze my torso, and I drop my hold on the drone. It has fulfilled its use for this maneuver. I run behind cover when Tanya delivers the good news.

  “Jamming field detected. It’s three floors up.”

  Where the nuke should be, but something doesn’t add up.

  I take mental control of my fighter and open up on the mech. This gets its attention, and its shields are holding steady. The mech returns fire toward my ship. My shields are slowly recharging after the pounding they’d taken over the last few minutes, but they’re not yet strong enough to deflect direct fire from a mech this size. I analyze the building schematics and see a gas line passing near the mech’s current position.

  “Subtlety,” says Tanya. “I like that.”

  I fire once at the conduit. Gas begins leaking atop the mech. I let a few seconds pass so enough gas volume builds up. Then I move out of cover again and ignite it with a shot of my repulsor weapon. The explosion is massive. Flames shoot outward and smoke quickly fills most of the entrance.

  Three

  Mission completion time: T minus 69 minutes

  When the smoke settles, I’m surprised to see the mech’s big arm and legs emerge from the dark, gray, heavy smoke. Its metal body is still burning in places. At least its shields are down. I don’t think the mech knows where I am at the moment thanks to the explosion and the resulting commotion. I intend to use that to my advantage.

  I enter stealth mode, erect a liquid metal helmet to protect my head, and start running toward the mech at maximum speed.

  “What are you doing?” says Tanya.

  “Trying something new, and hopefully getting rid of that recalcitrant piece of metal. It’s been a thorn in my side this entire battle. We really need to get a move on.”

  I choose a running path that is free of debris and dead bodies when I reach top speed. About ten meters from the mech, I jump, legs aimed forward, and let myself slide on my back the rest of the way. I cross my forearms in front of me and use the liquid-metal augment to create two very long, extremely sharp swords to extend from them. When I’m under the mech’s legs, I uncross my arms and slash the giant blades.

  They slice through the mech’s heavy armor as I slide under and cut it into multiple pieces. I retract the blades, get back on my feet, and I drop out of stealth. The mech explodes before all the sliced parts can reach the floor, resulting in another huge blast that makes the ground shake briefly. I’m momentarily engulfed in flames myself, but my shields protect me from the heat.

  I call the elevator, and we’re off to the third floor.

  We need to get the jamming field out of the equation. It will help deal with any other foes that may try stopping me from reaching Ahmed, and may also help us locate the nuke so we can neutralize it before turning my attention toward my arch enemy.

  I check my power levels to find they’re at ninety-eight percent. Overcharging has proven to be a smart move.

  When the elevator doors open, the first thing that catches my eye is the lush vegetation. This is the garden floor of the building. I don’t have time to admire the beautiful natural scenery as an array of red targeting lasers converges toward me. I dart outside the elevator and dash to the side. A flurry of fire is screaming past my face. There are at least six turret sentries in range shooting at me.

  “Do you know the location of the jamming device?”

  “Behind the sentries, of course,” Tanya answers.

  Of course, it is. But then I realize that I might have an easy fix for that new problem. I take control of one of the drones and have it fly here. The jamming field makes that very difficult, and I’m having trouble keeping the drone flying straight. I even lose contact with them a couple of times, but still manage to fly them somewhat. An idea to improve the task comes to mind.

  I blast a hole through the glass as more laser fire hits the back of the column I’ve taken cover behind. The hole in the window helps with the jamming somewhat, but I still find it challenging to keep the drone flying straight. Large chunks of concrete explode behind me, and I know I won’t be able to stay behind this column for very long.

  Hopefully, I don’t have to.

  The drone shoots past the hole I blasted moments earlier, and I send the command to overload its power source. I send a holo-ghost to run on the other side of the room. All the turret sentries are tracking and firing at it the moment it runs past me.

  I send the overloading drone past the turrets at top speed. The moment it’s behind them, I set it to self-destruct. The explosion takes out three of the nearest turrets while the resulting short-range EMP disables the rest of them.

  The lights on that floor blink briefly before turning off altogether. Whatever static from the jamming field was interfering with my neural instrumentation is now gone.

  Two birds, one stone.

  I’m starting to get more useful tactical telemetry from Tanya, who didn’t wait for my command to do a full tactical sweep of the building.

  I go toward the now disabled jamming device. It’s not that big considering how large a range it had been affecting. It’s barely bigger than an apple. I smash it with my foot for good measure. The last thing we need is for it to reactivate in case it has secondary backup circuitry.

  More data appears on my HUD by the second. There are more than fifty soldiers left, a few mechs, more automated defense systems and, finally, the location of the nuke. It’s on the roof.

  “Has Ahmed not yet deployed it?”

  “Or he decided that to get to it, you’d need to get through him. Eleanor’s signal is also placing her on the roof.”

  “Had I known, I wouldn’t have wasted ammunition, time, and power coming from the bottom of the building.”

  “It’s obvious that whatever data we gathered during pre-deployment has changed. The nuke’s position is probably not the only difference,” Tanya adds.

  “It also makes everything more difficult. If the nuke is where most of the troops are, then it will make fighting on the roof very difficult and risky. At worse, we could blow it out in the middle of the firefight. We need a new plan of approach; one that allows us to isolate the nuke first, then take out Ahmed and his men.”

  “Agreed. Computing multiple scenarios. I’ll soon have a few tactical solutions for you to review.”

  “We’d better get moving in the meantime. I’m sure Ahmed is aware his jamming field is down, and he’ll be sending goons this way sooner rather than later.”

  “You may want to have a surprise ready for them when they get here.”

  “Good thinking, Tanya; what would I do without you?”

  “I don’t know, but I’d rather we didn’t find out.”

  I smile. For a tactical AI she really has my kind of humor.

  I booby trap the place before we leave the level and set a drone in sentry mode for good measure. Whoever is coming through here thinking to find us won’t, but they’ll get a fight, nonetheless. And if they’re dumb enough to come through the elevator, well then, it’s game over for them before the doors fully open.

  With the elevator booby trapped, we start making our way up inside the
tall skyscraper. After climbing tens of floors and a couple of easily dispatched encounters with guards sweeping the area, I realize that there has to be a faster way.

  I punch a window on the thirty-third floor and call my starfighter. Its canopy opens with a single thought, and I jump inside.

  “Where are you on your tactical approach, Tanya?”

  “Going by ship as you’re doing is too dangerous. But we can use it to get higher faster.”

  I didn’t think otherwise. It’s too risky to open fire on the roof with the nuke there. The last thing I want is to be the one setting it off.

  “I’m open to suggestions then, Tanya.”

  She shows me a couple of scenarios, and one, in particular, catches my attention. It will be a little time consuming and needs some prep work, but I think it’s the safest way to deal with the situation and the clock that’s ticking rapidly down. When I reach the two hundred and sixtieth floor, I let the ship hover, fire a single shot to blast the nearby window, and jump out of the ship and back inside the building.

  I roll onto the carpet of what looks like an administrative open space, and I feel trembling under my feet. I get visual confirmation that the charge on the main elevator has blown. Looks like they did take the elevator; bad move. Farewell, suckers.

  I count six fewer soldiers on my HUD. I travel the last few floors via the stairwell. On the last floor, two men are guarding the stairway exit. Before they can do anything, I send a pair of smart shuriken flying through their skulls. They collapse on the floor without too much fuss. I enter the hallway and scan the area. It appears clear. I use my HUD data to find offices located right under where the nuke is deployed. I call five of my six remaining drones that are still functional.

  This is a bold plan, but considering how this entire day unfolded until now, it’s probably the safest plan of action. At the very least, it’s the one that has a serious chance of giving me the necessary time to diffuse the nuke before going after Ahmed.