Grendel Unit

by Bernard Schaffer

  "Are you listening to me?" Vic shouted.

  "No, I'm not listening to you, you maniac! I'm trying to get us into the ship!" Frank gunned the engine and they rocketed forward, not slowing down.

  "Frank?" Vic said, nervously eyeing the rapidly approaching hull of the ship.

  "Shut up, I'm trying to concentrate," Frank muttered, keeping the throttle cranked all the way back.

  "Listen, I'm sorry. Slow down before you kill us!"

  Gunfire ricocheted off the back of the bike, sending sparks and hissing bullets flying past their heads. Above the groan of the ship's engines and the gunfire and their own arguing, all they could hear was Hill sobbing in the back seat that they were going to die.

  "Hold on!" Frank called out as the bike zoomed through the hatch's opening and he yanked the handlebars down, sending the bike into a skid and them headfirst toward the wall, the bikes metal scraping and sparking and the thrusters firing out of the open door.

  Frank kept the throttle down, sending long jets of flame scoring out of the hoverbike to keep the bikers from flying in after them, only releasing the lever when the hatch's metal door began to close.

  Once it was sealed, Vic wiggled out from under the bike and bent to lift it, just enough for Frank to squirm out. Hill had been thrown from the chariot seat and was slumped against the compartment's wall, staring at both of them wide-eyed, but neither of them paid him any mid.

  Outside of the ship, the modders were circling around, gunning their engines. Frank flinched when several gunshots struck the side of the ship and he looked nervously at Vic and said, "Can they shoot through our shielding?"

  "I doubt it," Vic said. "The Samsara isn't built for galactic warfare but unless we're stupid enough to stand here and let them blast us, we can take off."

  Frank started behind him, following him toward the cockpit. "The what?" he said.

  "The Samsara," Vic said. "The name of the ship you've been flying around is the Samsara. Nobody told you that?"

  "Maybe because it's a stupid name," Frank said. "What kind of an idiot name's a ship that?"

  Vic looked back firmly at Frank and said, "The kind that just saved your hide."

  Frank stopped to look out one of the observation windows and saw there were more and more hoverbikes joining the fray and said, "You're sure they can't get through our shielding?"

  "Not with those guns," Vic said over his shoulder.

  The bikes armed large cannons on their sides and front lined up alongside one another and their barrels started spinning, gathering speed until they whined. From the rear of the formation, the crunching sound of tracked tires rolled across the landing deck, its engine louder than all the bikes combined. Its heavy armor plating had only narrow slits to see through and the driver knocked down the wall of a building trying to turn the tank around to face them. There were parked cars in the way but the tank just rolled over them and crushed them to the ground, all while maneuvering its massive gun turret to get it centered on the Samsara.

  "What if they have a tank?" Frank called out.

  "Don't be stupid, why would they have a…" Vic turned and looked out the window and he bent forward, craning his neck to get a better view. He took off running down the corridor, shouting, "Bob! Get us out of here! They're going to blow up the damn ship!"

  They found Sgt. Bob Buehl standing over the weapons console with his arms folded, glaring through the window at the hoverbikes outside. The weapons console was filled with red error icons.

  "We have to go!" Vic shouted.

  Buehl stared straight forward and said, "No."

  "No? What the hell do you mean no?"

  "I mean, no," Buehl said. "They shot my ship. Nobody shoots my ship. Nobody."

  "Warning: Shields integrity at fifty percent," a computerized voice said from the console.

  "Then release the weapons systems," Buehl ordered the console.

  "Request is invalid," the computer replied. "Firing on individual land-based targets is prohibited."

  "Unless we're facing an emergency situation," Buehl said. "Shields are failing."

  "They're failing because you're just sitting here letting them shoot us!" Frank shouted. "Get us the hell into the air!"

  Buehl turned and looked at Frank with gritted teeth and said, "Nobody shoots my ship and gets away with it, you scrawny little sludgesucker lover. You understand me?"

  One of the gun-mounted hoverbikes erupted, punching holes in the shield of the lower deck and scoring the ship's siding. "Warning! Warning! Deck 4 has been breached by hostile fire," the ship announced.

  "Give me an emergency override and release the weapons systems, then," Buehl commanded. "Or else, I'm going to let those maniacs turn you into enough scrap metal to refit a dozen sanitation drones. Give me weapons control!"

  Another burst of fire struck the sides of the ship, and the tank's turret squared up with them, about to fire. Buehl sighed in defeat. He reached for the emergency take-off button, when the computer finally recognized the heat-signature of the tank as a threat and all of the weapons systems flashed green, ready to fire.

  "That's my girl," Buehl mumbled to himself as he bent forward and quickly scanned the selection of available guns. "That looks good to start with," he said, then dropped his finger onto the screen.

  A massive anti-personnel chain gun rose up from the Samsara's roof and immediately began to swivel back and forth, searching for targets. It hummed softly as its barrel spun to life and one of the hoverbikes flying past appeared to seize in mid-air, shaking violently as holes appeared in both the bike and the modder operating it. The gun continued to scanning and humming and within seconds, five more modders were blown to pieces.

  The tank's gun turret recoiled and it let off a deafening shot. The electro-static shell tore through the air toward the cockpit. A direct hit would have killed them all, but the shell's aim was high and instead, it sheared off a layer of roof shielding right above them. The operator quickly began recalculating his next shot, while Bob raced to enter a series of commands into the console and the screen centered on the tank, lighting up all the narrow viewslots in the sides of the heavy armor.

  "Do we have anything big enough to blow that thing up?" Vic said.

  "Hell no," Buehl said, frantically typing. "What we do have are worker bees. Little nano machines I can deploy in space flight to fix holes in our siding.

  "Oh, how nice," Vic said evenly.

  "Yeah, it's good for if we get hit by an asteroid or something."

  Vic grabbed him by the arm and shouted, "I don't care about the damned worker bees, Bob! Either blow that tank up or get us in the air."

  Buehl punched in his last command and a dozen tiny flying capsules sprang into the air from small compartments in the sides of the Samsara and went whizzing across the landing deck, heading for the tank. "I can also deploy them to other locations, you know, short distances for light repair work."

  Buehl's eyes lit up as he looked down at the screen, watching the swarm of worker bees sprout multiple sharp-edged screwdrivers and brightly burning torches just before they vanished inside the tank's viewslots. Both Frank and Vic turned and looked at Buehl, who only smiled and said, "They're repairing anyone inside that tank right now."

  The hoverbikes were scattering, trying to outrun the ship's chain guns, but Buehl keyed in a sequence of icons and there was the loud sound of something rumbling high up on the roof of the ship. Frank looked up in time to see a bright streak of light fly high into the air, raining what looked like golden rain down on the remaining hoverbikes and modders. Each spark popped and sizzled as it descended, but instead of fizzling out, they gained velocity, getting bigger as they sped up, homing in on the terrified-looking modders. The sparks burst in the air with bright electrical flares that sent arcs of current dancing across their bodies. They dropped over the side of their bikes like stones, and as most of them fell, they pulled the bikes down on top of them.

  Buehl smiled at the pile of writhing
, leather-clad bikers. The ones who could move were crying out in pain, their limbs either twisted in the wrong direction or pinned beneath the heavy weight of their vehicles. Buehl clapped his hands together eagerly and said, "All right, you cybernetic scumbags. Time to wrap this up."

  "That's enough," Vic said, putting his hand on Buehl's arm. "Cease fire."

  "But, they shot the−"

  "I know, I know," Vic said. "They shot the ship, and we did what we had to do, but the threat is over. We're killers, that comes with the job, but we aren't murderers. Understand?"

  Buehl took a final look at the squirming, vulnerable, modders, and slammed his fists on the console in frustration. "If we leave them, they are going to try and retaliate, sir. They will not forget what happened here and someday, somehow, we're going to wish we'd eliminated the threat."

  "You know what I call that, sergeant?" Vic said. "I call that job security. Take us up and get us off this rock."

  "Aye, sir," Buehl muttered.

  Frank watched the pilot bang and slam his way back into his seat and begin the launch sequence. The Samsara's engines fired and rumbled as they began to lift and Frank had to put his hand on the console to steady himself and swallow as hard as he could to get his ears to pop. "We're killers, but not murderers?" he said quietly to Vic. "That sounds like a complicated philosophy if you ask me."

  "I am large. I contain multitudes."

  "That's a quote, right?" Frank said. "I remember seeing that before."

  Vic shrugged and said, "When I'm not organizing drug deals with underworld biker gangs, I'm a renowned philosopher. I don't like to brag, but, by definition, everything I say is a quote."

  The ship stabilized as it reached Iscariot-Four's upper atmosphere and Frank took a deep breath and waited for his stomach to settle. He was taking his time before making the journey back down the corridor to find Lieutenant Hill and assess his injuries. The stars glittered in the distance and Frank looked down to study the console controls and said, "Which button opens the hatch? I can think of some extra cargo I'd like to dump accidentally-on-purpose."

  "How bad do you think it's going to be?" Bob Buehl said.

  "Bad," Frank said.

  Buehl turned and looked at the closed door in the corridor, biting his lower lip with worry. Cojo and Hill had gone into the room together a half hour before to teleconference with General Milner.

  Frank heard the familiar announcement of a special news bulletin coming in over the wire and he turned to see a grainy security image of himself pushing the modder's hoverbike out of the alleyway on Iscariot-Four. A female newscaster said, "Earlier today, unidentified Unification agents reportedly stole an expensive hoverbike while it was unattended."

  The video then showed Frank, Vic, and a sobbing Lieutenant Hill, gunning it down the motorway, trying to escape the modders chasing them, however, the video was conveniently cropped to only show them. "After a harrowing chase by local authorities, that placed countless lives in jeopardy, the agents fled into their ship," the announcer continued.

  The next shot was of the Samsara, hovering above the landing deck, guns blazing. The roof turret was spinning and shooting in every direction, firing large laser blasts at unseen targets. "Prior to leaving, the agents fired multiple times at allegedly unarmed pedestrians, causing multiple fatalities and serious casualties. No comment has been received from Unification Command as to whether or not this was a sanctioned operation by their government, but local community leaders in the Iscariot System are demanding answers."

  "I'm not taking the fall for this," Buehl muttered. "I got a wife and a kid and another on the way. They asked me to fly this ship in their stupid unit. I was just fine where I was. You ask me, this is all their fault," he said, with a nod toward the closed door.

  The door opened as Buehl stopped speaking, and Vic Cojo stepped out, looking pale. Over his shoulder, they could see Hill sitting in front of the viewscreen, still talking to the General. Selling us all out, Frank thought bitterly. That worm threw the rest of us under the bus and now we're all going to wind up in the janitorial fleet while he gets off scott-free. Hell, they'll probably find a way to give him a medal for all this.

  "Well?" Buehl said.

  Vic turned to make sure the door was shut behind him and kept his voice low, saying, "They want to demote us all and sanction the entire unit."

  "I knew it," Buehl spat. "I knew it! I should have never taken this assignment. Everybody warned me that Command uses you and spits you out when it's convenient."

  "Keep your voice down," Frank hissed. He turned to look at Vic and said, "Let me guess. Lieutenant Lipservice is in there doing whatever it takes to save his own hide."

  "I have no idea," Vic said. "The general ripped us a new one, and told us what he was going to do, and Hill asked to speak to him in private."

  "That scumbag," Frank muttered. "All you can see in that video is him curled up in the backseat, begging us to save him. It's his fault the newscasters made us as Unification. They zoomed in on his stupid shirt and saw his emblem."

  The door opened again, and a stricken-looking Lieutenant Hill came into the doorway and stopped, taking a second to look at each of them. His face was blotchy and sweaty and he looked about to be sick, or at least, more sick than he usually looked during spaceflight. Hill swallowed to clear his throat and said, "The general would like to speak with you all."

  "I bet," Frank snapped.

  Hill ignored him and turned down the corridor, heading for his bunk. Vic watched him go and then waved for Frank and Buehl to follow him into the room. All three men sat down in front of the viewscreen to face General Milner. Milner waited for all of them to stop moving before he folded his hands on the table in front of him and said, "Lieutenant Hill has informed me of what occurred today."

  "The jackhole version, I'm sure," Buehl whispered.

  Milner looked each of them over and said, "And I want you boys to know I'm proud of how you pulled through it. Hill wasn't ready for command yet, apparently. I made a mistake sending him off on his own, I suppose."

  Vic leaned forward in confusion and said, "Are we still getting demoted, sir?"

  "Everybody else is staying the same rank except you, Mr. Cojo."

  "Wait a second, General," Frank said. "Vic is the reason I'm still here right now. Hill and I would have been wet spots on the concrete back there if this man hadn't saved us. If you're demoting him, you're demoting me as well. I'll voluntarily change rank, I don't care."

  "Fine," Milner said. "In that case, I'm making you an Acting Lieutenant, Kelly. And you, Mr. Cojo, are temporarily promoted to the position of Commander. You are in charge of Grendel Unit until I can find a more suitable replacement."

  Vic and Frank turned to look at one another, then both men turned to look back at the screen. "Thank you, sir," Vic said slowly. "We won't let you down."

  "You better not," Milner said. "I'm taking a chance with you boys, but I suppose these are desperate enough times to take a chance or two." The general leaned forward and typed into his computer, "I'm sending you coordinates to your next assignment. On your way there, you can drop off Lieutenant Hill at the nearest way station. Remember what I said, boys. Do not screw this up. Milner out."

  They watched the screen go black, all three of them unable to move.

  "You know what I think?" Vic said, finally breaking the silence. "I think we need to find a new member of the team, quick, before the general can send another one of his cronies."

  "Roger that," Buehl said. "With my luck, he'd send us some damned sludgesucker in the name of universal equality or some other PC garbage."

  "Hey," Frank said, snapping his head around. "That's the last time you use that word on this ship, you understand? I'm not going to risk my life to defend Unification if I'm surrounded by people who are going to piss all over what it stands for. If you don't like it, you can get off at the way station with Hill."

  The muscles in Buehl's neck stood out like thick cords as
he looked Frank up and down, "You better think real long and hard who you're talking to like that, acting-Lieutenant. Don't think you're gonna come in here and start spouting off some high-handed liberal nonsense about how all the poor alien lowlifes just needs a chance!"

  "That's enough," Vic said. "Both of you shut up. We just got our own command of this unit and you two nitwits are already fighting."

  "He started it, Commander," Buehl said. "You know I don't like hearing that stuff about sludge…aliens."

  "You know what's going to happen, Bob?" Vic said. "It's a big universe out there, filled with strange and wonderful things of all shapes and sizes. Some people even think the universe itself is a living thing, with a sentient consciousness. You keep talking like that, saying aliens aren't worth a damn, and the universe is going to send one into your life that makes you reevaluate everything you believe in."

  Buehl looked at Vic for a long time, and then he said, "Ha! I'd like to see it try."

  13. There Goes the Neighborhood

  NOW

  Yultorot looked up from the tablet in his lap at the crewmembers in the cockpit and said, "It is time for me to do my daily recitations from the holy book. It is our practice to read aloud. I hope you find it instructive."

  "Bob, please crash the ship," Frank said.

  Buehl looked over his shoulder from the pilot's chair and said, "I heard enough of this crap growing up. You keep that brainwashing nonsense to yourself."

  Yultorot looked at Hill and said, "I was guaranteed by your father that my participation in your operations would not impact on the practice of my faith, Captain."

  Frank and Buehl both looked up, their eyes meeting in the reflection of the mirrored panel over Buehl's seat. It was clear neither of them had ever heard of Hill's father having anything to do with their operation. Or who the man was, for that fact. Hill shifted in his seat uncomfortably and waved his hand at Yultorot, "Just read your book and get it over with."

  "Thank you, Captain," Yultorot said. He cleared his throat and gazed serenely at the page on the tablet. "In the beginning, God made man and gave him dominion over the universe and all its inhabitants. He blessed humanity with the wisdom and skill to venture forth to new planets and solar systems, spreading the word of the Lord to all who would hear it. Every beast and insect and reptile and aquatic creature and flame-born thing and gaseous being all bent low to the ground before humanity's rightful superiority, and it was good." Yultorot smiled at Frank and said softly, "It was so, so good."