Lone Marine

by Nikolas Bunko

  Who knows? Maybe Cole will reveal some juicy bit of intel before the day is over.

  “C’mon, baby, let’s not fight,” Cole said. “Don’t you want a man who can understand you? Remember how we first met? I was so young when you took me in.”

  So, Cole had sought out the Sovereign. Before, Tully had tried to give Cole the benefit of the doubt, preferring to think of him as a poor brainwashed Marine on the wrong side of an alien interrogation. It didn’t seem like Cole was anyone’s victim now, except possibly his own. It seemed like Cole was a true dyed-in-the-wool believer of the anti-human cause. An anti-human human serving on an FDF flagship. Tully could hardly believe it.

  What am I saying? This is the military. Of course I believe it.

  “I think we need some alone time after this. No Tully. None of the others,” Cole said. “Just you and me.’

  There were others. It made sense. Tully had heard stories from other jarheads called to remote colonies to put down anti-human sentiment. But Tully often thought these were reserved for the truly desperate types. People driven to the fringes by the lack of the most basic necessities. It was a sad reality as humanity desperately tried to recover from the loss of Earth while still trying to maintain its FTL capabilities in the midst of an energy crisis. Some colonies were left rations of food, water and even oxygen. Couple that with politicians who thought themselves above the rationing, and criminals who sought to use the demand for their own advantage, and you could see a steady rise in fanatics who truly believed humanity was beyond saving.

  The only problem with that theory was that Cole didn’t fit the profile. Tully had read his file, just as he had read all his team’s files. Cole hailed from Ganymede 5, one of the cushiest colonies in the sector. He didn’t seem malnourished or desperate, nor did a judge force him to join the corp, as was the case with Tully. He seemed like a completely average guy – the last you would expect to be spearheading an alien invasion.

  “C’mon, honey, you know perfectly well I know where your on-switch is,” Cole said in a low voice. “Maybe tonight I’ll uncouple your array, dig deep into your thrusters and . . . flip . . . the switch.”

  Okay. I changed my mind. Kill me now. This is worse than anything the Sovereign could have planned.

  Eight

  So maybe Cole wasn’t completely normal. Still, he was a long shot away from the crazy rebels the FDF Marines had told him about. The anti-human movement Tully had heard about were relegated to austere climates, staging self-sacrificing attacks on their enemies. Save for a little sanity, Cole didn’t seem to be lacking much.

  “Well, fine, if that’s the way you’re going to be!” Cole stammered, throwing his hand down at his side. “Fine! I’ll talk to you later.”

  Cole stopped off, finally giving Tully an opening- as well as finally putting an end to the most awkward three minutes of his life so far. He slowly made his way over to the work bench.

  “Man, I miss the bachelor days when I didn’t share my mind with an eldritch from across the stars,” Cole said wistfully. A second later, he retorted. “Nothing, honey!”

  Like an angry child being called home by mommy, Cole stormed off, ice cracking with every stomp. Tully watched him from his hiding place and then slowly made his way towards the work bench.

  An assortment of power tools were strewn about, most likely taken from the work crews on the Astraeus. A large microchip sat in the midst of all the power tools. Tully scanned his surroundings for any sign of Cole. Then he picked up the microchip and opened a private channel to the Scout ship.

  “Tact,” he said. “Can you identify this?”

  “You are holding an X15 Odin Processor Chip, typically used in navigation systems,” Tact said in the typical monotone voice.

  “Like the collision avoidance system?” Tully sighed.

  “Correct,” Tact replied.

  “I’m guessing the collision detection system can’t function well without this,” Tully said.

  “Incorrect. The collision detection system’s default chip can function at approximately fifteen percent capability,” Tact replied.

  So, in other words, not good enough to avoid going splat on an ice moon.

  “How long would it take to install said chip in our systems?” Tully asked.

  “Approximately forty minutes,” Tact said.

  Great. Time I don’t have.

  “What’s the total repair time to install chip and make repairs to the ship?” Tully asked.

  “Seventy minutes,” Tact replied.

  “And how long do we have before the rendezvous window closes?” Tully asked.

  “One hundred and twenty minutes,” Tact said. “Starting now.”

  Tully wondered if it was possible for an artificial intelligence to sweat. It seemed like event Tact’s monotone voice was starting to waver, although that could have just been Tully’s imagination. Then again, he doubted Tact wanted to spend the remainder of its days with Tully. The feeling was mutual.

  “Got it. I’ll be leaving soon. Just need to take care of something,” Tully said. “Leave the light on for me.”

  “The Scout ship’s lights are currently on power saving mode. Would you like me to turn them on?” Tact asked.

  Tully sighed. “No . . . just . . . leave them on . . . power saving mode . . .”

  Was it bad that he envied Cole? The Marine might have been off his rocker, but at least he had some kind of relationship with the ship’s artificial intelligence. The specifics made Tully squirm, but at the end of the day, it sounded a lot more interesting than all his dry conversations with Tact.

  The work bench also contained a number of alien devices that Tully didn’t recognize. Could these be the ones that Cole used to mask his vitals on the ship? It seemed likely, but Tully wasn’t sure which were which. He snapped a picture of some of the alien gizmos. When he got back to the Scout ship, he would search the hold to make sure similar items weren’t still jamming the system and preventing their escape.

  A series of small orb-like shapes caught his eye. There was a hum he could barely pick up, but it sounded familiar. Once again, Tully looked over his shoulder to make sure Cole wasn’t rounding the corner. Hopefully Cole was locked in a domestic dispute somewhere with Missus Sovereign. Tully knew he was in prime ambush position, just as Cole had been not too long ago. Still, this find might be worth it. If he was right, this could be a game-changer.

  Tully contacted Tact again and had the recording from his faceplate camera opened. He then navigated his HUD back to when he first entered the tunnel through the cavern. He ordered Tact to eliminate any ambient noise and isolate the one sound in the tunnel. The sound in the tunnel was identical to ones being emitted from these devices. It was the same tunnel that had collapsed when Tully first tried to escape the cavern.

  It was time to test a theory. Actually, it was time to test two theories. Tully really hoped this didn’t blow up in his face. He picked up one of the orbs and moved to the hull of the alien ship just a yard away. He extended the orb until it was less than inch from the hull, and then let go. The orb attached itself to the ship like a magnet. Tully waited for a minute, checked for any sign of Cole, and then removed the orb without any problems.

  These are remote detonation mines.

  Nine

  Tully smiled to himself. These had potential. He squeezed the orb and watched it light up. This hopefully meant the mine was armed. He gave it another squeeze and the lights disappeared. He hoped he hadn’t confused the two. The other problem was the detonator. As far as he could tell, Cole had it – at a distance he saw an object in the Marine’s hands when the tunnel blew. He just needed to get the detonator from Cole . . . and then it would be a party.

  He didn’t like walking around with the detonators on him. That seemed like an easy way for Cole to take him out, especially if he noticed they were missing. He figured he’d put them in some creative places, just in case Cole got the urge to try.

  “It’s time
for an Easter Egg Hunt,” Tully said to himself.

  “Eggs spoil easily, so they are not included in this mission’s rations,” Tact’s monotone voice rang out. Tully had forgotten he was still on.

  “Good-bye, Tact,” he said, signing off. He looked at the ship before him, and the cavern which held it. It was time for him to do some real damage. For the first time since he arrived, he wasn’t just running and hiding. That had changed.

  Now it’s time to go on the offense.

  Tully decided against putting charges on the ship itself. For one thing, he didn’t want to risk Cole finding the charges before it was time to set them off. Secondly, he didn’t want the alien spacecraft to learn about his plan either, if such a thing was even possible, and he definitely didn’t want to risk incurring more aggression from the spacecraft.

  Instead, Tully decided to limit the detonators to causing enough damage to the cavern itself. He placed the charges along those cavern walls which seemed to hold the most weight.

  If only I’d paid more attention in geology class. Or if I’d taken architectural classes, for that matter.

  Still, he was a Marine, meaning he was trained in the basics of many military disciplines. One of those just happened to be combat engineering, which was coming in handy right about now.

  Tully had about ten detonators to work with, and he knew he had to use every single one of them. He didn’t want to risk Cole using the detonators against him. He placed four detonators on each wall of the cavern itself.

  He then threaded his way through the center of the cavern, keeping a sharp eye out for Cole. He hadn’t seen the crazy Marine in a while, and that was starting to make him nervous. Then again, hopefully this meant Cole hadn’t seen him, and his absence was starting to make Cole feel equally uneasy.

  I don’t know if it’s possible to make Cole sweat. He’s so far up an alien spaceship’s ass, he doesn’t feel a thing.

  The sensors on the foot of Tully’s armor told him when he was standing on thin ice which might break under his weight. That was precisely the spot in which he placed the detonator, leaning down to cover the charge with a thin layer of ice and snow.

  For the remaining detonators, Tully searched for nearby ice spikes within the cavern to set the charges. Sure enough, Cole came around the corner, whistling while lugging a large generator behind him. Fortunately, Tully was behind a row of stalagmites, granting him some cover. He only had to stay very, very still in order to not catch the treacherous Marine’s suspicious eye.

  Cole set up the generator and then cheerfully went on his way. Tully could still hear the whistling as the man stumbled onto the next cavern.

  What the heck does he need new generators for?

  It was then that Tully remembered how the ship looked as though it was growing into the ice instead of the other way around. Maybe that was how the ship naturally interacted with the environment. Instead of becoming covered in ice and frost, the ship reacted paradoxically, until it overtook the entire landscape. Tully guessed the generators were to help free this ship from its icy cage.

  Tully placed one charge on the bottom of the generator. He definitely didn’t want to be around when this went boom. With any luck though, he’d still be around for the fireworks.

  “Tully! Oh Tully!” he heard a voice in the distance.

  Cole.

  “Tully!” his voice echoed through the cavern. That gave Tully an idea. He found the epicenter of the cave, picking the one place he knew would produce the most echoes.

  “Cole!” he shouted, and the resulting echo through the cave sounded like a crow cawing.

  “Nice trick,” Cole said, his voice echoing less. Tully knew he had to follow the sound. He had to find the source of the noise. He needed that detonator.

  “My wifey wanted to let you know that the Astraeus just punched into the system,” Cole announced.

  “Your window is closer. In one hour, they’ll pack up their things and leave. And let’s be honest – even if they sent another team, they’d still never find you, since you’re trapped in here with me and my honey.”

  Shit. He’s right.

  Cole knew the time table. He’d take every precaution to make sure that didn’t happen. Tully crept through the tunnels of the cavern. He knew the place by heart by now. He would find Cole. And end this. And then he would make his escape.

  He was crawling on his stomach along a garden of stalagmites. It was the best position to avoid detection, and it also granted him natural protection, thanks to the large spikes protruding from the ground. He spotted Cole three clicks away, on the largest of the snow drifts, overlooking the cavern. He was holding something. At first, Tully felt his heart lift, thinking it may be the detonator, until he saw what it was.

  A battle rifle.

  Somehow Cole had retrieved one from the crash. He was now peering through the scope. Instinctively, Tully backed away as best he could, before pushing himself into an upright position behind the largest of the stalagmites.

  This is bad.

  Ten

  There was no way Tully could sneak up on Cole, not while he had a battle rifle. He had to think. What advantages did he have? He was unarmed.

  Tully had never seen Cole fire that thing before. Given what he knew about Cole, he reasoned he was a poor shot. Cole didn’t seem to like to get his hands dirty, even from behind the scope of a rifle. He was more of a saboteur, preferring to admire the results of his handiwork from a distance. Tully reached into his pocket and pulled out a flare. He then tossed the flare as far as he could, several yards to his right.

  He heard the barrage of gunfire. Cole had taken the bait. Then Tully made his advance. It would take Cole at least ten seconds before he realized what he was looking at. Just enough time for him to clear the distance between him and Cole.

  If he was lucky.

  Tully’s feet pounded against the surface as his heart beat loudly through his ear drums. Adrenaline washed away any doubts he had over this course of action. Cole’s assault rifle let out a rat-a-tat-tat explosion, and for a moment Tully thought he might be dead. Even in the midst of running, he found himself checking for bullet holes, realizing the HUD would have flashed red the moment he sustained damage to his armor.

  He pounced on Cole a second later, pummeling the mad Marine into the ground. Cole might have been a weak fighter, but he still had his hand wrapped around a battle rifle. That gave him a deadly advantage. After all, Cole only needed to raise the rifle and pull the trigger to end this fight. Tully had to keep his advantage, punching at the Marine’s faceplate in the hopes of shattering it. After a few blows, Cole was sufficiently dazed and Tully was confident a few more punches would shatter the bubble, killing Cole in a matter of seconds.

  As he raised his hand for the killing blow, the ground gave out under him.

  “Uh oh!” Cole crackled. “You made her mad.”

  Tully struggled to his feet, but Cole had beat him to it, slamming the butt of the rifle into his head. The only good news was that, with the ground shaking beneath them, Cole wasn’t able to get off a good shot. That didn’t stop him from trying. He leveled off several bursts of gunfire, with almost none of them hitting Tully, with an intermittent red flash signaling he had been clipped and grazed a couple of times. Fortunately, the Vulcan P7 Armor excelled at protecting the Marines inside from just about everything but several sustained direct hits, and Tully was pretty sure he hadn’t suffered any physical damage.

  Cole realized this about the same time, and he twisted the battle rifle to use as bludgeon since it was clear the steady stream of hard rounds wasn’t having the intended affect. The spacecraft was keeping up the earthquake, giving Cole the home court advantage. Tully advanced forward, only to have the battle rifle’s end crash headlong into his faceplate. He couldn’t take too many hits like this. Cole might be a crude fighter, but he was dangerous – alien spacecraft or not.

  Tully blocked the next hit and laid in several blows to Cole’s body.
His fist connected with Cole’s armor several times. The problem was, while body blows could disorient or even incapacitate an opponent, it was hard to penetrate the armor. Tully couldn’t be sure how much damage he was actually doing to Cole, whose arms continued to flail out openly.

  Frustrated, he battled away another blow from the battle rifle and then pulled Cole closer to him, knowing one punch to the visor would end everything. Instead, Cole reeled back and heat-butted his armored forehead into Tully’s visor. Tully staggered forward. He could see the beginnings of spider web cracks on his faceplate. The HUD flashed red, as the words “BREACH IMMINENT” raced across his screen. He wasn’t gasping for air yet, so Tully guessed the faceplate was probably holding. Still, if he took one more blow, however small, the structural integrity of his faceplate would collapse.

  At this point, Cole could flick his faceplate and it would shatter.

  This is bad. This is really, really bad.

  The one advantage was that Cole didn’t know this. He swung madly at Tully. If he had to guess, Tully thought that Cole was probably dazed from that head butt. That’s why head-butting isn’t recommended in CQC. Even an armored Marine suffers disorientation after the fact. Cole didn’t know how close he was to winning, but at this point, he didn’t care. He just wildly punched at Tully. On the other hand, all Tully had to do was dodge and stay out of range of his attacks to be safe. At first this seemed to frustrate Cole, but then Tully saw a cruel smile tickle the corners of his mouth.

  Shit, Tully thought, having long since learned a smile on Cole was never a good thing.

  Cole reached for his battle rifle, firing errantly into the air once more.

  Tully dived aside, reaching the relative security of an ice drift even as he heard the rounds ping off his armor. The good news was that his face plate was still mostly intact, and he wasn’t in danger of suffocating any time soon. The bad news was that the ground was still shaking, and Cole was still laying down a steady stream of fire from his battle rifle.