Enforcers 2099UG

They operate in secret. They are known only to one. They fight heroes and corporations alike in an attempt to keep the country together. They are the manifest will of a President that is supposed to only be a figurehead. They are her ENFORCERS.

::Ernesto’s Italian Restaurant just outside of Andrews Air Force Base::

Ernesto’s was a fine little place with warm intimate lighting and a friendly staff. Ernesto Bartotti, the plump little owner, had strived hard to make it a place where people would feel comfortable after a long day of work. He even went to expense of using candles on every table, and had an extensive cocktail bar. He also had the genius to put data ports and outlets at every extra wide table. The few feet of space he lost may have cost him the volume that other local establishments received, but it did afford him a very loyal customer base of clerical staff from the air force base. Nobody thought anything of data displays, small computer workstations and files and papers being shuffled around at any time of the day. The only thing that might have stood out to a stranger was the amazing thought that the military bureaucracy still used actual paper. It was certainly no place one would expect to find the leader of the United States.

Tucked into a very private corner booth was Madison Dazmary, President of the United States. She wore a stylish brimmed hat to ward off the snow, and her winter coat was hung neatly on a hook in the wall next to the booth. The sunglasses she wore were not at all out of place for winter in Washington DC, considering the depleted ozone allowed through rays that could make an eye cancerous after reflecting blindingly off the snow. Her business suit was fashionable, but off the rack and not stunningly expensive, just professional. She sat in the squeaking synthetic leather booth sipping a cocktail nibbling at warm breadsticks, and obviously waiting for someone. The waning winter daylight came though the door and the window and highlighted an attractive face, though one starting to display wrinkles at the corners of the eyes and mouth. No one at Ernesto’s thought anything of her; she was just another person coming to enjoy a cocktail after a long day at the office.

The door opened and another woman entered the restaurant accompanied by the clinging of the little bell attached to the doorframe. Madison waved at the woman, and the woman began to stroll her way. It was the easy stroll of one who was confident and sure of herself. It was a stroll that was justified in Kiwana.

Kiwana was not tall, but she was not short either, being about average height, she had a slender build but still managed to have a nice chest and rounded hips. She wore her hair in braids tipped by colorful beads, which stood out against her black shirt, deep red leather coat and matching leather pants. Kiwana’s face had high regal cheekbones and a wonderfully warm smile, and the small button of a gold nose piercing only accentuated her skin like a treasure lying on dark velvet.

She did not go unnoticed by the males of the restaurant or even a few of the females as she glided to the booth where Madison stood up and have her a friendly hug.

“Kiwana, it’s so good to see you. Sit down and order a cocktail.”

“Maddy it’s been too long. I can’t believe how the years have gone by. You certainly have come up in the world.”

“I suppose you could say that. I have been told you are doing so badly yourself.”

“Not really. I have been living in Miami mainly, trading in the futures markets. I seem to have a knack for it,” she said with a twinkle in her eye.

“I can bet you do,” Madison replied. “You always have been very lucky,” and they both laughed at that. “I was not sure you would come today. My new position does not afford me many allies.”

“How could I abandon my sorority house room-mate?” Kiwana said with a warm smile. “You and I know each other far too well to ever abandon each other. Speaking of your new position how did you manage to slip away?”

“You would be surprised how many tunnels are under DC. Even with the destruction of removing President Doom, there is an entire warren of tunnels that very few people are aware of.”

“Interesting piece of data.”

“I thought so, that’s why I went to the trouble of making sure I have the only complete map,” Madison smiled at Kiwana and then at the waiter who came to take their order. After the waiter left she continued, “At any rate, I am glad you came all this way. I want to know if you will use that ability of yours to help me Kiwana. I am having some problems and as I have said, I have few people I can rely on.”

“What is troubling you Maddy? You mean to tell me you don’t have the entire country and all the corporations dancing to your tune yet?” Kiwana said smiling again.

Madison’s demeanor turned serious. “Hardly, but I am hoping you can help me with that. There is a corporation that is trying to break away from the States and the other corporations cannot be convinced to interfere. I want to keep this country together Ki, and I cannot afford to loose a good chunk of one of the 52 States.”

“Who?”

“Southern Life and Health, based out of Dallas is trying to break away. They have the troops, they have the cash and they have the p.r. campaign to do it. Samuel Houston Lee is adopted name of the CEO, and would be President of the Republic of Texas Reformed. He would be taking Dallas, Houston and Austin with him if he broke away.”

“That’s a big job Maddy, but I can see your problem. If you cannot convince the other corporations to stop Lee then you have to use your Presidential powers. But Lee no doubt owns a lot of Congress, and if you take military action the other corporations will turn against you.”

“And my administration is too new to resist that kind of pressure. I have to be careful or Stark/Fujikawa will make sure the next President is their plaything.”

“So why me?”

“I think you already know Kiwana,” Madison said as she leaned in closer. “I need someone that can slip into an state of armed resistance and get back out again. I need someone I can totally trust. Lastly I need your unique ability to work in my favor. I’ll be honest with you here Kiwana, if this fails, or comes out in public, there is a chance that I will be removed from office in a very fatal way. You have known me long enough to know that when I am up against odds that are not in my favor I cheat. Between your ability and your training, you are my ace.”

“Maddy, it’s been a while since I have been in the game. I am probably pretty rusty.”

“Nonsense, besides you won’t be alone. Take a look at this,” Madison said as she slid a data pad over to Kiwana. “This is a database of over 75 operatives that I have access to. They are identified by code name only. You will only know them by their skills and that code name. You choose a team, you do this mission and you are done. Nobody ever has to work with anyone else ever again. The idea is a team that I control striking from the shadows and then vanishing. Code name Enforcers.”

“Clever, and a good concept. I presume that if there were missions in the future that team leaders could use all new personnel or they could stick with the people they are most familiar with?”

“Possibly”

“How many teams will there be?”

“For this mission two, you and one other. Do you accept then?”

Kiwana stared at Madison for a moment and they looked deep into each other’s eyes. They barely noticed as their dinners arrived and the waiter walked away.

“Yes, I will accept as a favor to you.”

“Thank you Kiwana. Look at those rosters and choose your team while we eat and catch up on old times. From now on when we have to meet it may be best if we feign not knowing each other. From now on I will refer to you as Sigma.”

“The 18th letter of the Greek alphabet. Does that mean there are 24 teams, 24 missions or are you just calling me that based on our old sorority?”

Madison smiled as she lifted a fork full of steaming linguini and then blew on it preparing to take a bite. “You must allow me some secrets Kiwana.”

***

::A bunker deep underground somewhere in Transverse City::

Madison and Sigma stood looking out of a window down into a large room set with a briefing table and at the people sitting around it. The glass was one way and the occupants of the room could not see them.

“Are you sure this is the team you want?”

“No. You are denying me the use of one of the one I want.”

“Ki…Sigma, I told you that it is a prototype. I cannot guarantee the reliability of it at all.”

“That is a risk I am willing to take. I think in this situation you cannot deny the potential need for firepower.”

Madison looked at her for a moment. Sigma did not look back but stared down into the room. “I’ll have it activated and sent in. I was only trying to think of your safety.”

“I know Maddy, I know.”

“I will leave you now to get under way. Good luck. Don’t let anything bad happen to you out there. I will debrief you in DC when you are done. Bring the AG3 and the craft back here.” With that said the President left the room, steely door automatically sliding shut behind her.

Sigma took the time to straighten her red leather garb, and to stiffen her frame, taking herself to full height. First impressions are important. “Here we go,” she muttered under her breath, and stepping to another electronic door allowed it to open and proceeded down the slightly curved ramp to the room below.

At the bottom of the ramp she walked directly to the table making eye contact with the three people seated around it. She remained standing. I was important to establish control early. That feeling of authority was quickly taken from her.

“Hot mama, I’ll be your play thing anytime you want,” said the Asian American man with his eyes shining.

“That’s enough out of you Nickleback,” Sigma cut him off. “When I need you to speak I will yank your leash.”

Nickleback laughed to himself, and then turned to the man in the cowboy hat seated next to him. “I think she needs a good man in her life for at least a half hour.”

“I dunno there slick, She don’t seem like your type,” was the deep southern reply from around a toothpick.

“I think I can take care of our friends cocky attitude,” snarled the tall woman in black leather, her red Mohawk haircut seeming to glow with anger. She played with a knife and made the slim blade dance between her fingers.

“Yeah I pegged you for a man hater right away. Too bad, tall women are nice when they wrap their legs around your…”

“Why you little runt! I’ll slice you open like a…”

“You just try it,” Nickleback said producing a short Oriental dagger from the folds of his dark gray jacket. “I think I will take some time with…”

Loud booming steps entering the room cut them both off in mid shout. A huge man-like shape of deep blue crystal walked into the room through another set of door from the ones the rest of the group excluding Sigma had entered. Each step reverberated the hard metal floor and could be felt up into legs and stomach of all that were there. It was about eight feet tall, and if you looked closely the overhead lights shone into the crystal composite showing electronics buried deep within. Its cold white eyes stared at all in the room as it examined each of them. A voice like glass thunder came from it as it spoke.

::I AM THE ASSAULT GENERATION THREE. DO YOU REQUIRE ASSISTANCE SIGMA?::

Thank you Madison for pre-programming it to recognize my command, Sigma thought to herself. “Not if these people all decide to act like the professionals they are. If any of you wish to question my command I would ask you to get it over with now. Do I have any takers?”

“Shock no!” said Nickleback as he put the weapon away and sat back in his seat.

“What the blazes is that thang?”

“Good question Hangfire. I think we all need to introduce ourselves. I am of course Sigma, and I will be the commander of this operation. I am skilled in espionage and certain other skills.”

“Such as?” Nickleback probed.

“That is for me to know. The AG3 here is your backup in heavy fire situations. He is a state of the art search and destroy construct. Nickleback, why don’t you go next?”

The young Asian American stood up and bowed at the waist to the assembled group. “As Sigma has said I am Nickleback, one of the best combat technicians you will ever find, if I do say so myself. I can slice dice shoot and score on anything.” He winked at the tall woman with the Mohawk before continuing “Well almost anything. I’m probably the best that the Ivy League has ever produced.”

“Best of what?” Hangfire asked.

“Combat attorney, magna cum laude.”

“Hangfire you are next.”

The man with the cowboy hat stood up and tipped his hat to Sigma. “Well, let’s see here y’all can call me Hangfire. I’m a transport specialist. Ain’t nothing on this planet I can’t fly drive or repair. It’s gonna be my job to get y’all in and out with your skin still on,” he said in his deep voice.

“Great, I come here to kick some major tail and here I get to ride into town with Pa Cartwright.” Taunted Nickleback.

“Awww now son, I didn’t go and piss on your biscuits when you was doin your rooster strut now did I?”

“Raid, that leaves you.”

The tall woman did not even stand up from where she sat playing with the knife. “I am a net-glider. I can kinda respect what you do,” she said nodding towards Hangfire “since it’s working with machines. And I would really love to jack into big blue’s system for a while and see what’s there. As for the runt there anyone can hack away with a blade, and I’d be happy to show him any time he wants how we do it in downtown Transverse.”

“That would be fun, you could use the lesson I’d give you.”

“That’s enough of that!” Sigma said forcefully. “You might not like each other but the fact is you are here because I chose you. You will have to rely on each other if we all want to make it in and out in one piece. After that you don’t ever have to see each other again and that will be the end of it. But until then this is my show and I am in charge and the next person out of line will have to answer to me, am I being clear?”

::AFFERMATIVE::

“Yeah.”

“Yes ma’am.”

“What do you think you could do? Sick big blue on me?” challenged Nickleback.

Sigma stared at him. This had to stop and quickly or she would never get him under her control. “Hangfire, hand me your toothpick.”

“What?”

“Hand me your toothpick.” Opening his mouth the southerner complied and stretching out his arm handed the toothpick to Sigma. Nickleback sat there with an amused look, trying to keep from totally loosing himself is a gale of laughter. Sigma faced towards Nickleback with the toothpick in her hand.

“What do you think you are going to do to me with that?” he chuckled.

“This,” she replied coolly. Sigma reached out with her mind. Before her lay the infinite pattern of quantum variation, like a kaleidoscope of possibilities. In one version of reality, of quantum variation, Hangfire had handed her a weapon instead of a toothpick. The variation was far away, and Sigma had to really stretch to reach it and pull it in. But she wanted to make a very large impression on the thin muscular man.

Nickleback never saw it. Even with his enhanced reflexes and hours of combat training he had no time to react. To his eyes one moment Sigma held a toothpick, the next the twin barrels of a Cadieux Double-Fire Shotgun rested on his temple leaving two cool circles where they made contact.

“Shock me!” Nickleback shouted as he threw himself back onto the floor tipping the chair and tried to scramble away.

“You know, I’m pretty damn sure that there has never happened before,” mused Hangfire with a smile.

“How the shock did you do that?” Nickleback shouted.

“Do you really want to question me anymore or can we get on with this briefing?” Sigma said with a cool voice and set the gun down butt first leaning against the table.

Trying to regain his dignity, Nickleback stood up and brushed himself off. He took his time but watched Sigma with a wary eye. Finally trying to ignore the smirks of Hangfire and Raid, he turned his seat back to its base and sat down. “Ok, lets get this briefing going.”

***

The large Mag-lift truck sat parked on the side of the highway in the area that in days gone past had been used to weigh trucks to make sure they did not damage the highway. The sign on the small building read Texarkana Texas Registration Station. Men in dark green and tan uniforms stood all around the station, with large rifles slung over their shoulders. Next to the station on a small tower was a cannon on a hydraulic swivel mount with its tech person sitting in the seat monitoring a console. The other guards all wore helmets that had a thin pane of plastic that come down to cover one eye, which displayed targeting data and could see into the infra-red portion of the spectrum.

An officer, of middle age with a doughnut stomach left the side of the last truck, and waived it on, then with his hand motioned for the truck to pull forward on the examination bed. The bed was a series of projectors on the driver’s side, and complex image capture netting on the other side. When the truck had pulled into place between the two large pieces of tech, the officer stepped up onto the rail board and looked into the truck.

“Howdy Officer, how are ya’ll today?” asked Hangfire from around his toothpick.

“Fine, could ya hand me your log please?”

“Yessir,” Hangfire slurred as he handed the lumpy officer the datapad. “I passed through a SHIELD check post back yonder, why do I have to be checked again anyways?”

“Didn’t you hear?”

“Hear what?”

“Texas kicked SHIELD out and their contract with it. By law Texans don’t have to put up with an outside contactor when there is an in state firm capable of doing the job. So a lot of us Texas natives quit SHIELD and came into the Texas Rangers Incorporated, and picked up some troops from local corps too. Heck the whole outfit is full of troopers from Southern Life, especially the Officers.”

Hangfire smiled, “Well that has got to be the best news I have had in a long time. Them boys in SHIELD they like to be all high and mighty, but would you believe they had to actually physically search the rig? It put me hours behind, look at the log files.”

“Yeah, that’s part of why I quit, they were always skimping out in the interstate budgets. No pay raises, kept thinning out the pension and health benefits. Equipment is shoddy as hell in some areas too. Would you believe that they actually wanted me to pay out of pocket for my health club benefit?”

“That just ain’t right.”

“No it ain’t. Well, we have some good money here in the Texas Rangers. You should check it out on the message boards. They are looking for people to haul heavy equipment. Never have to deal with SHIELD again at least, not without being able to take a shot at them,” the tubby man laughed as he handed the log back.

“I might just have to do that.”

“Well, just hang on, we have to scan your cargo bed, they you are on your way.”

“Thank ya.”

“Y’all have a good one,” said the officer as he stepped down and nodded to the man controlling the sensors.

A moment later the man in the window cleared the cargo and activated a green light telling Hangfire to move on. He did so and waved at the officer who did not appear to see him, being preoccupied with getting the next truck in place.

As the truck moved down the ramp to get back on the interstate, a little door opened from the Cargo area and Nickleback slipped through, placing himself in the passenger seat of the truck.

“Things are getting a little heated back there,” he said jabbing his thumb backwards.

“What the check post? No we had that in hand fine.”

“No I meant Raid,” the Asian man laughed. “She was going to try and teach me some manners again.

“Y’aught to leave her be, she might get angry at you again.”

“She already is.”

“I meant Sigma,” Hangfire grinned at Nickleback’s souring face.

“I cannot believe I am riding in a truck like this. How undignified.”

“Well, I can’t help you much with dignity, I’m just the driver.”

“We cold have taken a flying gunship, or a sky car or anything and been there by now. And wit a better transport than this.”

“I have to disagree with you there. Trucks are invisible. Tons of ‘em cross the States everyday. This thing is a tank with the extra armor we have in it, and yet most civilian authorities won’t even glance twice at it. Plus we needed something to haul that big glassy bastard.”

“I thought they scanned this thing. They didn’t notice the extra lifting units, armor plating, guns, people in the back or that big talking ornament. How did you manage that?”

“See this here wire running from the back of my head to the dash of the truck? This thing allows me to drive this rig like I can walk. I feel the engine rev like it’s my heart and I could control the guns and armor systems as sure as you can use your hands. So y’all have ‘ta know I know what I mean when I say people rely on machines too much. Now if they had just walked to the back and opened the doors we would have been fried. But a few years back they decided “hey, how about if we x-ray trucks. They cant hide anything that way, and it kills all sorts of germs.’ So that’s what they did. Now here we come today and we pull on up and while I’m shooting the breeze they scan the truck. Cept what they don’t know that the armor plating on one side is absorbing the x-rays and a flat panel projector array is sending what I want it to send to the receiving net. I could have convinced them the Easter Bunny was in her if I’d wanted to.”

“Pretty slick,” Nickleback had to admit.

“And here you though I was just some old trucker,” Hangfire grinned.

The door to the cargo area opened and Sigma leaned through it. “How long until we get to Dallas?”

“I don’t know, how fast do you want to get there?”

“Not very fast.”

“Well, I can take a rest stop. Truckers are required to rest still, so nobody will think anything of us parked there for hours.”

“Good do that, and then calculate when we leave. I want us there at 3 am to get us in place and begin at 3:30.”

“Yes’m I can do that.”

Sigma leaned back and shut the door. The inactive AG3 lay on a recharging table and Raid lay in a sleep like state plugged into the net, a flat wire ran from a hidden door in her forearm covered with sytha-skin to a datajack of a portable phone.

“Raid wake up.”

The green eyes fluttered under the eyebrow piercings and focused in on Sigma. “What is it?”

“I want you to leave a message on the billboard, encrypted, that we will begin at 3:30, then I want you to get some real sleep.”

“I know what I am doing, I don’t need you to tell me when to sleep.”

“That was not a request Raid,” Sigma said as she lay down on the other padded riding couch and leaning back used the meditation technique she knew to go into a light sleep.

***

The truck sat in the bay of the main loading dock of Southern Life and Health’s manufacturing and research plant. Yellow-orange sodium chloride lamps illuminated the bay with its concrete lip at the level of the trucks that would be delivering goods. And old battery powered forklift was the perch of three guards, who were fighting to stay awake during the dullest part of the whole shift. Moths flitting from light to light were usually the bulk of activity at 3 a.m. just after lunch.

But today there was a truck arriving late, which was slightly unusual, but only slightly. Lots of truckers prefer to sleep all day then have the highway to themselves at night. It can be a better way of making schedules. The truck was backed into bay 5, and a man in a cowboy hat was discussing the cargo manifest with the dock boss.

Nobody saw Nickleback slip out a door in the top of the cargo area. He crawled along on hands and feet with his stomach rubbing along the top of the truck. Carefully he peered over the edge and surveyed the situation. When he had the position of the guards locked firmly in his mind, he reached down and touched a switch on his belt buckle activating the kinetic modulation of his suit. Leaping into the air in a graceful arc, he landed on his feet hard on the concrete right next to the startled dock boss. The suit absorbed the kinetic energy of the landing which would have been hard enough to shatter unprotected bone. A microcomputer analyzed Nickleback’s body, and when he sprung forward into a flip it added the kinetic force to that of his legs, taking the small man further than any normal man could jump.

The startled guards did not stand a chance, before they could react to move the small Asian American landed in the midst of them, and once again the suit channeled the force of the landing, but this time it went out Nickleback’s palms as with his landing he flat handed two of the guards on the chest sending them flying back to collide forcefully with the forklift. The third guard managed to swing his stun baton, but Nickleback with the merest of a shrug of his head and neck caused the powered club to miss. His hand came up to the now overextended guard and connected with a nerve cluster in the unprotected armpit. The third guard crumpled to the floor with a whimper and a thud.

The dock boss, who barely had the chance to register all that was happening, was relived of the burden of analyzing the situation further when Hangfire’s fist connected with his flabby glass jaw and was stunned to the ground.

An armored robot that emerged from an alcove hidden by a holographic projector startled both men. The robot looked like a mockery of a man with a bucket jaw and large lit eyes. The arm that ended in a blaster was no joke however, and it quickly leveled itself at the two men and fired. With a loud “umph” Hangfire managed to throw himself out of the way by falling off the edge of the dock. Nickleback merely sidestepped the fiery beam and with a sideways grin to his thin features, reached back and pulled his sword and ran toward the battle droid. As the robot prepared to target and fire again, Nickleback slid under the arc of fire, and neatly sliced of the armored appendage, which fell to the floor with the crash of an old appliance.

A wave of energy that seemed to vibrate the air rippled past Nickleback and slammed into the robot, which seemed to freeze and melt at the same time.

“What did you do that for?” Nickleback called out to Sigma. And where did you get that EMP pulse gun? I know you did not have that before.

“You were going to let it call the reinforcements in runt?” chided Raid. “It likely had a communication package, lets hope it did not time to use it.”

“I had it under control gorgeous.” Nickleback knew Raid’s type. The fastest way to annoy her was to compliment her. He was proven right by the way her hand went to the knife on her belt.

“Both of you settle down. Nickleback, scout out and make sure we were not heard. Raid, get over there and see if you can bypass the door security. Hangfire are you ok?”

“I think so Ma’am, just a little mussed is all. My back sure will be feeling this tomorrow though.”

***

“Can’t you get past it somehow Beautiful?” Nickleback taunted Raid.

“They might have taught you a lot about fighting, but when it comes to locks you are about as stupid as a mengie”

“A what?”

“Okinawan for carrot,” Hangfire supplied the surprised group. “What y’all really thought I needed all this cyber to drive a truck?”

“My family is Taiwanese.” Nickleback said coldly. “It’s just a keypad lock, what can be so hard? Can’t you just deck in and change it?”

They stood in the corridor outside a room that held a server hub. Sigma and Hangfire watched nervously down the well-lit hallways, while Raid hunched over the lock. “If I was on the other side of the door and already in their system, not a problem. But I am not. Besides runt, for all we know this is a closed system, since that’s one sure fire way to keep thing secure from people like me.”

“I can cut it open.”

“That’s a adamantine door Nickleback, even if your alloy was better than the one on the door, you don’t have the strength and leverage you would need,” said Sigma.

“Then punch some numbers, maybe we will get lucky.”

“Be my guest if you are so smart,” Raid said standing aside from the lock. “But before you try let me forewarn you that likely this thing will only give you three tries to get the number right, and then the alarms go off screaming. Not to mention that it’s a 10-digit code based on the type of lock they are using. So runt lets see if you can keep up with this math. Even if they let you have all the guesses in the world, a keypad will make you wait a second in between tries, that’s the industry standard time out. If it was just 5 digits that’s 100,000 potential codes at 1 second each amounts to about 28 hours, assuming you did not repeat any accidentally. Now this is a much better model, 10 digits, that means there are over a million potential codes. Still feeling lucky?”

Nickleback just scowled at her seeing he had been bested in this round.

“I can get it open but it will take too much time and we will miss the rendezvous time.” Raid told Sigma.

The woman shook her head, beads clicking and popping as they collided, “That’s just not going to do.”

She stepped forward pushing in between Raid and Nickleback and slung her EMP rifle onto her back, and crouched down to look at the keypad at eye level. Reaching out with her mind probability spread out before her like a quilt on a table, and she followed the various threads as they wove and twisted. Off to the side were the dark areas, places where the worst of probabilities were. They gray areas where the probabilities were so slim they would almost certainly never have happened and beyond them the black where the place she stood and breathed did not exist at all. She chose a number in her mind, and searched for the reality shadow where the alarm technician had installed that number. Finding it gradually she grabbed it and pulled it into place.

For the others she had just spent a few seconds staring at the keypad, when she suddenly reached up and punched in 10 digits onto the soft plastic keys.

“That will never work…” Raid started to say, as the door unlocked with a loud and audible clunk. “How did you guess the code?”

“I didn’t” Sigma replied as the heavy composite door swung open on silent hinges reveling the server hub for the Dallas divisions nestled within. “Raid, get out your wires and get in there. They will be dumping the information from Houston to us soon and I want the Dallas data cleared out by then. Nickleback shut the door and make sure nobody gets in. Hangfire as soon as she starts coming out of the glider-coma I want you to use your internal remotes and start warming up the truck. This is it ladies and gentlemen, the king is in check.”

***

A red-tailed hawk flew over the dark starry landscape, soaring past golden pyramids, red spheres and iron cubes that represented databases, switches and nodes in the system. The hawk tilted its head and watched the data stream along roads composed of silvery light and as she looked closer she spotted some that interested her.

Wings tilting on a air current that was no more than stimulus transcribed to the hypothalamus and sensory areas of a far away glider, the hawk dropped like a stone in a fast dive. At the last moment the hawk opened her great wings and as she was landing blurred into a form like the one she wore in the flesh.

Raid reached into the stream of data and pulled some of it out. It glowed in her hand like a handful of electric threads of glowing numbers and letters. Raid activated the decrypt chip that was buried in the warm blood and flesh of her body, and in the net a large crystal ball like one a fortune-teller would use materialized floating next to her. Looking thru the crystal she could see past the encryption and into what the data truly was.

“Interesting. Southern life has been making some very heavy duty combat armor of late. Gee,” she asked herself sarcastically “I wonder what they could be planning?”

With but a thought she summoned the drones of the copy and move subroutine. She was not being paid for this bit of data, but it might come in handy later. The drone bumblebee icons began grabbing threads of data, replicating them and flying away with the replica. Not far from here physically but continents away on the net the drones would be depositing the data in a large sphere with the imprint of a hawk on it. The data storage device she had plugged into the net.

Glowing green numbers popped up next to Raid, reminding her that the time was near to catch the data stream from Houston. She had set the pathways using old and rarely used switches and hubs. She had not run into any system administrators yet, but caution was always the better option.

“Hey you, what are you doing there?”

Luck, it seemed could not last forever. The system administrator looked like something out of a Storm Troopers dream. His icon was splendid in a pressed uniform and medals that actually glowed with a dim light. He floated in space, with his finger pointing menacingly at Raid. He hovered closer and closer shouting “You cannot be authorized to do that, let me see your pass now.”

Raid looked at the man with pure contempt. The freedoms of the whole net at his command and here he was a wage slave with corporate thinking wearing the same icon as every other idiot in this entire system. When she did not answer him the man pulled a gun from his holster and aimed it at her.

It was not a gun of course, but an icon representing a program, likely one that would send a pulse of electricity back along the physical connections and do some damage directly to the brain of Raid. It was not a large icon, so it did not represent a large or very powerful program, and probably would only stun her. The net worked that way most of the time. Large icons represented large programs and small icons small programs or sub routines. It was supposed to be a visual cue that had been designed to make navigation of the net easier for a layperson.

Raid did not surrender though. She quickly reached into the “pocket” of her clothes and produced a gun of her own. Like some strange cartoon, the gun that Raid pulled from her pocket was huge, and deserved to be mounted on the front of a tank or perhaps a battleship of old. With a cliché bull’s-eye target on the end the admin tech found himself at the end of 10 meters of cannon being held like a pistol by the woman he had attempted to confront.

Dropping his gun the tech tried to fly away, but the gun in Raid’s hand disappeared and in its place was a small metallic spider. She threw the spider at the tech and it slammed into him and exploded into millions of strands of fine wire that wrapped around him. He fell helpless to the floor even as Raid walked up to him. She reached out and pulled a small radio from the technician and made it wink out of existence.

“Can’t have you calling for help now can we? Here is a tip for you in the future rookie. In the net a large program has to have a large icon, but sometimes an icon is just an icon.” With that she dug again into her pockets and pulled out a thin sheet of material that matched the starry sky of the system background. She unfolded it until it was the size of a blanket and began to cover the technician. “Don’t worry, I’m sure they will find you later today, assuming they take the patience to physically follow the connections. Of course if you have an impatient supervisor who is mad at you he might just unplug you at your datajack. Don’t you hate the three day migraine when that happens?”

The sheet muffled the technician’s shouting, and once it was in place over him it blended perfectly with the background so that it was as if the tech was not even there. Raid smiled to herself and transforming back into a hawk launched to travel back to her data storage device.

***

Sigma and the rest were in the back celebrating the job well done as the truck sped through the purple and orange dawn of the Texas highway. Hangfire had kept to the lower profile highways, and the truck made good time speeding and not slowed by traffic as it boomed towards the boarder with Oklahoma. The wire running from him to the controls of the truck allowed him to keep his hands free, which he had knitted behind his head. He would have let the autopilot drive, but he wanted to remain vigilant and Sigma had agreed, so he monitored the minutia of the trucks performance, the map data, and the communications frequencies.

He had just convinced himself that maybe for one a job went off without a hitch when the broadcast began. It ran across all the citizens bands and was very hard to ignore as Sam Houston Lee with his white mustache and gray hat addressed him out of the thin air.

“Hello Hangfire, this is Sam H. Lee talking to you, but I think y’all already know that. I’m betting you can hear me because you are the cautious professional when it comes to making a getaway.”

Hangfire could not believe what he was seeing and hearing in his head through the datajack, but was helpless to respond to it. If he sent a message out, they would locate the signal in moments.

“Now your probably wondering ‘How does Sam Lee know me’?” the wealthy CEO continued. “Well thing is I don’t really, but it seems that you tripped one of the hidden DNA sensors when you and your friends broke into my place last night. Then it was a simple matter of buying the information of who you are and what you are about. Now if you are a smart man, and I know you are, you will broadcast a signal to me or better yet just come back to Dallas with my data. I know the people with you might not be happy but I can assure you I can take care of them, whoever they are. You just come back here right quick, because if you don’t there seems to be some people here who are going to have to pay your debts for you.”

The view panned out to show a small family at the gunpoint of several Rangers. Shaking the man looked about unsure what was going on, and the woman with her small children sobbed and huddled together for strength and safety that did not exist.

“Seems that you have family that works for me, which is not surprise you being a fine Texan yourself. You come back here, and I will give a talented individual like yourself a fine position in the Rangers. Don’t take too long.”

The message then began to loop over and over. Hangfire cursed under his breath. His cousin Tom and his wife Julia, and Bobby and Sandy. Dammit why didn’t anyone mention they worked for Southern? There was really only one thing he could do. In his mind he triggered the switch that would activate the stun field in the bed of the truck. Looking though his connection to the security camera, he saw that they were all unconscious, having never suspected the stun wave coming.

His eye caught the form of the big Assault robot lying prone and inactivated, and a thought began to form in his mind. Consulting the maps he saw there was an uninhabited stretch of badlands nearby. Switching from mag-lift to a cushion of anti-grav he left the highway. As the truck reached the badlands, he turned again pointing directly back to Dallas. Lifting his altitude, he opened the cargo bay drop doors and rolled the plane of the truck slightly while releasing the cargo harnesses. Out of the bottom of the truck like some great glass bomb, the form of the AG3 fell to the Earth a dozen meters below. On impact it began to come on-line so damage could be repaired, and blue streams of energy coursed along circuits buried deep in blue crystal.

Hangfire saw the beast move and activated the heavy thrusters of the truck, and raced off in the direction of Dallas, the wake of the truck leaving a wide swath of upturned soil pointing the direction like an arrow.

**

He saw it drop from the sky and the truck jetting off in the distance like a phoenix of fire and blowing sand. Curiosity then grabbed him by the worn poncho he wore and dragged him like a child to the carnival. He could not figure out why the truck had flown so, or what the shining blue object it dropped could possibly be, but he approached where it landed with the caution he would give an angry rattler.

As his old worn brown boots took him closer, he saw that the blue was crystal like and that this sparkled in the desert sun like a broken bottle, and worse yet it was in the shape of a man. As he stood there looking down at it, the great bulk moved slightly. Fearing what he did not know the man retreated away quickly and hid from view behind some large rocks, and gathered his will in, incase he needed to do more than hide.

The great blue man slowly sat up, then stood, its head with eerie almost not there eyes surveying the land around it as its head slowly swiveled on its neck. A rumbling voice did not call out, but spoke at an unmistakable volume.

::YOU ARE A CLASS B MUTANT. PLEASE IDENTIFY YOURSELF AND STATE YOUR INTENT AND PURPOSE::

Startled, but obviously found out, the man stood slowly, fighting the urge to put his hands in the air. “My name is Luis. I was just…ah…camping out here away from it all when I saw you get dropped from that truck that went screaming back towards Dallas. What are you?”

::YOU POSE NO THREAT TO THIS UNIT. I WAS DROPPED BY THE TRANSPORT AFTER THE MAIN OBJECTIVE WAS COMPLETED, INDICATING UNANTICIPATED CHALLENGES. INITIATING SEARCH MODE:: the AG3 said as it began to lumber off towards the distant city of Dallas.

“Wait a minute,” Luis shouted as he ran towards the AG3. He was growing suspicious and was a man who had long ago learned to trust his gut in every area except when to eat the hot salsa. “What do you need to go to Dallas for?”

::THAT IS ON A NEED TO KNOW BASIS::

“I might be able to help you, depending on what your goals are. How would it affect things to tell you I am a hero from Mexico City, and came to try and prevent an alliance between the Texas and Mexico City?”

::THAT IS NOT WITHIN MY MISSION PARAMETERS::

“How about this then. I think if this is as fast as you can go, that I can get you to Dallas a lot faster, plus I have some knowledge of the defenses that are around some of the key places in Dallas, like say the Southern Life building?”

::EFFICIENCY AND INTELLIGENCE GATHERING ARE ALLOWED IN THE PARAMETERS OF THIS MISSION::

“Great Amigo, I knew we could strike a deal. You tell me why you are going to Dallas and I will tell you what I know”

::CURRENT OBJECTIVE. RETRIEVAL OF TEAM LEADER, MEMBERS AND DATA FROM A HOSTILE ENVIRONMENT::

“What data?”

::CORE RESEARCH DATA OF SOUTHERN LIFE AND HEALTH::

Stunned, Luis stared as the automaton plodded over the badlands. This was more than he could ever have prayed for, and he had been praying a lot. Many a restless night had been spent praying for a way for Luis to breech the defenses of Southern Life. His powers out in the open desert were astounding, but inside an enclosed area, were very weak. “Amigo, if that’s what you are after I can definitely help. How much do you weigh?”

::THIS UNIT HAS A NON COMBATIVE MASS OF 272 KILOS::

“That should be no problem,” said Luis as the wind around them began to whip sand and dust into small funnels and crashing waves. A gust of wind and a whirling dervish came to pick up both Luis and the AG3. “I will tell you about the defenses of the main building as we fly. By the way Amigo, call me the Dust Devil.”

**

“Lieutenant, we have another large sand and dust storm beginning to roll in to the area, about 5 clicks out now.”

“Call the Sky Rangers and tell them to get battened down in the garage. We lost quite a few to sand contamination last time and I don’t want it to happen again. Double the tank patrol to compensate.”

“Yes sir”

**

Floating on a cloud of dust and wind the AG3 conferred with the Dust Devil.

::THE GROUND TROOPS AND SKY UNITS ARE RETREATING TO THE BUNKERS::

“Did I tell you or what Amigo?”

**

Deep within the tombs and catacombs under the monolithic tower of the Southern Life and Health Corporation’s tower, was a septic and clean holding cell with a shiny new door made of a titanium steel alloy. The room had no furniture, but the floor was padded and the hard white light of a fluorescent light stick shone down from behind its protective plastic covering. In nothing but their undergarments and bound hand and foot were the members of Sigma team. None of them dared to move, the monofilament wire laced rope that they were bound with would cut things pushed against it like a sharp knife through canned meat. They dared not even breathe deep for fear of the damage that could be done to arms and ankles.

Sigma tried, but the reality where they were bound with something less was far too remote, and even the alternatives she could grasp were not much better with reinforced plastic razor wire or stun collars. So they sat waiting the fate that would only come with time, and contemplated what happened, and what had made Hangfire turn on them.

“Shocking hayseed inbred bastard,” Nickleback spit, “When I get my hands on him I will rip out his throat with my bare hands.”

“For once I agree with you,” added Raid, her datajack plugged with an epoxy and her built in augments scrambled by an EMP pulse cuff on her arm. “I am going to sink a knife into him and watch him scream.”

“Just shut up both of you,” Sigma cut them off. “We are not sure what happened, lets not jump to conclusions.”

“Oh shock you! You recruited us, your damned luck must not work with people. You sure picked a good one. Maybe later you can recruit Jack the Ripper to be our field surgeon!”

“I said shut up, we will just have to wait to…” Sigma was cut off by the door to the cell sliding open, and two Rangers body-guarding Hangfire and Sam Houston Lee.

“Hope ya’ll don’t mind the room,” Lee drawled out. “We hate to see guests leave before we let them go.”

“You as…” Nickleback’s shout at Hangfire was cut off as the butt of a Rangers rifle connected with his head. Groaning Nickleback leaned back against the wall.

“Now now, “ Lee admonished. “We don’t like that kinda language down here in Texas. Now Hangfire, why don’t ya tell me what you know?”

The man in the cowboy hat removed it and wiped his brow before perching it atop his head again. “Well, that’s the one that hired all of us.”

“Who is she working for?”

“I don’t know chief.”

Lee leaned down to whisper into Sigma’s ear. “Why don’t ya’ll just make this easy on yourselves, and tell me now what I need to know?”

“I’d rather die”

“Well, wouldn’t that be a shame. Waste of perfectly good talent. Why don’t you just tell me who you are working for and come work for me instead. I’ll give ya’ll twice whatever you are getting paid.”

“It’s not enough.”

A rumble worked its way through the building with the feel of being in a deep drum as it was hit.

“What the blazes was that?” Lee asked. A comm-link on his ornate Texas belt buckle came to life and a voice came ringing through.

“Sir we appear to be under some sort of attack.”

Lee, looking annoyed tapped Hangfire on the shoulder. As the bodyguards waited, Hangfire pushed his hat back a bit, and pulled his ever-present toothpick out from his mouth. “You Yankees gotta learn not to mess with Texas”, he said with a grin and flicked the toothpick at Sigma. It hit her in the shoulder lightly, and bounced down to where it could easily be reached by her hand. Sigma looked up and made eye contact with Hangfire, who hiding his face from the bodyguards with his hat, winked at her and quickly stepped out of the room to catch up with the storming Samuel Houston Lee.

**

The sandstorm swirled in a pattern not found in nature, concentrated around the Southern Life building, where its cutting shears eliminated the ground troops and air reinforcements that normally were present, and made it impossible to see. The sand however still could not hide everything from the complex sensor arrays of the floating hover tanks marked with the proud Texas Rangers logo. Inside the tight compartments sweaty men tried desperately to hone huge cannons in on a target the size of a single man. They needed more skill than what they had.

Outside the tanks in the howling wind The Assault Generation 3 did what it was designed and built for. It stepped in close to one of the tanks and underneath the main turret. It was now too close to the tank for the other tanks to fire on it with safety, giving it room to operate. The tanks we made of a composite alloy layered and magnetically charged for extra stopping power and ray protection. The tank commander saw the AG3’s proximity and turned the tank on its floating platform to try and give the anti personnel weapons on its side a chance to fire. The AG3 anticipated the maneuver, and moving against the direction of the tank was quickly at its rear. Reaching back with its shining fist, the AG3 extended a stabilizing gravity field around itself that gave the artificial man unearthly mass. The fist shot forth in a slight arc, and with a scream the alloys gave way as the entire arm of the AG3 sunk into the interior of the tank. The AG3 had the specs of this model of tank on file, and placed the strike with a surgeon’s precision, its hand deep in the tank shattered the capacitor array of both the main and secondary power systems. As if someone had cut the invisible wires holding it afloat the tank fell straight down without grace and crashed to the concrete, sinking in like a bird settling into a nest.

Seeing that the first tank had just died, the other tank commanders were not content to wait, and the closest one opened fire with the main turret. Yellow crackling energy burst from the barrel and raced towards to the AG3, which had turned to face the remaining foes. The energy slammed into the crystalline man, but instead of evaporating the target, the energy was absorbed into its glassy skin. Energy could be seen sparkling around under the surface of the AG3 like the blue strobe of an airport runway light trapped under a punch bowl. Before the startled commander could order his crew to fire again the AG3 raised its arm and the energy, now a bluish green burst from its fist in a tight beam. The cannon and main turret of the tank were sheared of like a sharp knife slicing the top off of a dinner roll. The tank exploded in a fireball, decimating the cars parked around it.

The three remaining tanks decided on a charge and flew towards the AG3 in a tight arrow formation hoping that brute force would overcome where other weapons had not. At 65 tons each flying at nearly 120 Kph, it was a tactic that had the numbers in its favor. Unimpressed by the approaching wave of alloyed titanium and ceramic, the AG3 turned and with a strange grace grabbed the dead tank by its framework, and with a mighty lift hoisted the tank over its head. It threw the tank with remarkable accuracy and then another shot of blue green energy shot from its eyes. The tank on the left flank was forced to intercept the projectile tank with a crash like thunder, and both tanks shredded and ground to a halt. The tank on the right flank found its main antigrav drive hit by an impossibly accurate beam, which sent it out of control and crashing to an undignified landing. The fountain in the front lawn of Southern Life was made of rare pink marble flown in from Europe, and on normal days set of the color scheme of the building behind it. Today the waters were already chocked and brown with flying sand when the tank careened into it crushing the marble to wet gravel. The point tank however was not to be denied and increasing its speed even more bore down on the AG3 like a demon possessed. Calculating that the impact was not avoidable the AG3 increased its gravity generators to full and braced itself for impact. The tank bore down on it like a bull chasing a matador.

The collision when it came was impossibly loud, sounding like the world largest crystal glass singing a duet with Big Ben as a Nazi bomb stuck. When the fire and explosions finally settled down the wind began to settle as well, and the dust storm leaving small piles on cars and steps subsided as well. Floating down from the sky his poncho flapping in the slowing wind Dust Devil could not believe what he was witnessing. The charred and torn remains of the tank were spread in a curious U formation about the standing crystal blue man.

**

“The tanks appear to be destroyed sir,” the commander of the observation room reported. Sam Lee and Hangfire stood near the center of the room, which was filled with data displays, satellite feeds and computer consoles displaying every corner of Southern Life’s corporate life, including the carnage outside the very building. “I will dispatch another squadron and the ground troops.”

“You buffoon, what the hell are ground troops and more tanks going to do? Now I ask you where the hell your common sense is boy!” Lee stroked his beard and twirled his white mustache. “Let out the Titans.”

“Sir?”

“You heard me boy.”

**

“Amigo that was amazing!” Luis said to the Assault 3. “I have never seen anything like that at all!”

::I HAVE A LOCK ON THE OTHER TEAM MEMBERS INSIDE. I WILL NOW BREAK THE BUILDING SECURITIES AND RALLY WITH THEM::

The ground began to rumble under their feet and seams began to form in the concrete of the landing area near the edge of the parking lot. The parking area opened like a trap door swinging up, flipping several abandoned sky cars like toys off into the manicured lawn. Two massive heads emerged from the hole and rose followed by bodies of metal and composite ceramic. When the lifts finally stopped standing before them were the Titan robotic siege weapons. With a crew of three these dangerous prototypes stood over 50 meters tall and weighed over 200 metric tons each.

Heads swiveled and focused on the AG3 and Dust Devil and cannons burst forth on housings along the massive arms, and missile batteries swung open from behind huge doors in the chest plating.

“Holy Scat!” Luis shouted launching himself into the air to flay away.

::NEW ENEMY DETECTED, PREPARE TO ENGAGE::

**

The building rumbled and shook with the force of the battle going outside as Sigma, Raid and Nickleback emerged from the weapons locker where their equipment had been stored.

“What is all that?” Nickleback asked.

“There is still one member of our team unaccounted for,” replied Sigma.

Looking up at the ceiling above them Nickleback stared “You mean the walking tree ornament? Could it be doing that level of damage?”

“You might be surprised.”

I have to get a better look at that thing, Raid thought to herself.

As she stepped over the unconscious form of a Ranger, Sigma tried to decide their next move. “Good job with the guards Nickleback…”

“For a runt,” Raid squeezed in

“…I hope you are not wore out, we still have a lot to do before we can get out of here.”

“You cannot seriously be thinking about finding Hangfire!” Nickleback grunted. “ I don’t care what you say, I think that goofy looking line dancing idiot set us up, and we should let him hang.”

“I don’t care what you think. I didn’t bring you to think. We got out because he helped us to get out. We are going to find him and he is going with us. Period. Raid if we find you a place to jack in, can you locate where Lee and Hangfire are?”

“This building has internal personnel monitors, so yes I should be able to find them.”

“Good, there is bound to be a terminal near here someplace…Let’s try this hallway.”

“Why that one?” asked Nickleback.

“Have I been wrong yet?” Sigma said with a grin on her almond shaped face.

**

“Sir, we just got a report from the detention blocks. The prisoners have escaped and we don’t know where they are.”

“Dammit! Put the internal guards on high alert.” Lee said. Staring at Hangfire he jerked his head to a side door and left the sterile grays and exposed metal beams of the command center and went through a door that opened after reading his retina. On the other side the door shut and Hangfire stood with Lee in Lee’s office. The room was decorated with wood, Texas memorabilia and the heads of dead animals. Lee took his hat off and tossed it with contempt onto his desk. His face was red and eyes blazed as the building rumbled with more of the battle outside. “You better tell me what is going on right now!”

“I don’t know!”

“I think you are lying to me. I think you know exactly what’s going on. What is that thing out there, and how the blazes did your friends escape?”

“How should I know, I am on your side,” Hangfire said standing with his palms facing forward in the universal gesture of “hey just a second here.”

“Bullshit”

“I’m telling ya’ll the truth!”

“You sir, have crossed the line and went over to the Yankees. But worse than that you have lied to me, and that,” Lee reached under his coat and drew an old chromed six-shooter out from his shoulder holster. He pointed the .44 at Hangfire and watched the panicked look on the man’s face. “That will not stand.”

Hangfire tied to run as the gun went of with an explosive pop, and flames and smoke rushed out of the barrel with their old sulfur smell. The heavy bullet slammed into him. A .44 is a large round, and there is a lot of force behind it. As it hit Hangfire he was lifted from his feet, the shock of impact threw off his hat and actually pulled him out of his boots. Hangfire, the bullet and his blood all hit the wall with equal force leaving a large red running mess cascading down the wall.

**

The Titans had stopped their barrage to survey the damage they had done to the target. Nestled in the ever expanding crater that was the main parking lot, the AG3 was crouched down in a defensive posture.

::STRUCTURAL INTEGRITY AT 74%. UNIT CANNOT WITHSTAND ANOTHER ATTACK. BEGIN COUNTER ASSAULT::

Climbing up out of the hole, the AG3 fired a beam of bluish green energy from its outstretched fists at the Titan robots. The beams cut deeply into the hard outer shell of the first unit, and hydraulic fluid and sparks began to leak out. But the damage was not enough, and the AG3 had no specs on an enemy like this. It had no knowledge of the vulnerabilities like it did with the tanks.

With a reverberating boom the Titans began to move in closer to the AG3 cannons leveling at the now slightly cracked man below. Above them, not perceived as a threat the Dust Devil watched and realized that his best chance for breaching the defenses of the building was about to fail.

He knew that the Titans were too heavy to lift, but maybe he could distract them. Gathering the wind he snatched a few of the ruined mag-lift cars and the twisting wind lifted them up and threw them with force at the heads of the massive robots. The cars crunched into the heads of the Titans, but the monsters ignored it as they would a fly. Instead of helping Luis found he had to quickly fly to dodge the secondary fire from smaller guns looking for new attackers with automated precision.

The AG3 scanning the Titans for weaknesses saw the cars hit, and detected the mutant abilities of the Dust Devil in action. Calculating in its internal probability algorithms the possibility of surviving a specialized attack it turned up the volume of the sound synthesizer buried within its throat area.

::LAUNCH ME::

Luis heard the call from below and hoped that the monsters would not realize what was happening until it was too late. Gathering in the swirling wind again he lifted the AG3 from the ground as he had done before. The cannon blasts decimated the ground where the crystalline man had been standing moments ago and computers and sensors tried to keep up with the unanticipated movement the small enemy. The AG3 flew up and up in the powerful wind, and then forward at incredible speed at the main chest and body of the undamaged robot.

“Just call me David, Amigo”

But the jest was unheard by the Assault robot who was processing trajectories and speeds with crushing volume. It rolled up its body in the form classic to any child attempting to make a splash in the family pool and at the last moment so it would not fall short of the Titan, increased the gravity field and mass to their maximum setting.

The blue glass cannonball slammed into the Titan with a force incomprehensible to people without advanced physics degrees, but the reality of it was evident to the command crew as soon as it happened. Thrown violently against their seat restraints circuits and displays began to bloom in flowering sparks and went dead as the sensation of falling backwards made them grab at their controls. The Titan fell, its shadow grew large over the cars of the lot, the eerie moment of silence before the hammer fell. The crash of the titan made some of the towers reinforced windows buckle in their frames and the ripple of the impact spread through the concrete like a wave in a small pond tossing other cars about with brutal force. The Titan’s main power supply fell off line with safety precautions and the massive robot went dead. The damaged Titan scrambled to remain on its feet

From above Luis screamed a yahoo with glee, “David one, Goliath zilcho!”

From the wreckage of the fallen Titan the AG3 emerged like a moth from a cocoon. It stood up and jumped down with a crunch into the shattered concrete next to the Titan corpse. Walking towards the other Titan it said with volume, ::AGAIN::

But before the Dust Devil could act the second Titan lifted a huge foot and slammed it down, stomping on the already damaged AG3.

**

Sam Houston Lee stood there holding the gun when the impact of the Titan hit the building. Plaster crumbled from the wall and trophies shook. The elk head fell and crashed into the expensive bottle of brandy that he had bought off an estate sale just last month. Rushing back into the control room through the door to see what was happening Lee let a string of cursing pollute the air with his passing.

Moments after he left the other door, the one to the hallway, had a slight verbal argument outside of it. The blade of a sword pierced the door and its wood paneling and vibrated slightly as it hung there for a brief moment before cutting a large rough oval. The oval shape fell in and landed on the floor bouncing a few times like some oversized coin.

“I could have gotten it open in a few moments you runt!” yelled Raid.

“I got it open now didn’t I?” smirked Nickleback. Seeing the carnage inside the room everyone’s breath caught in their throat. Sigma rushed to Hangfire, and found that he was still breathing. When she tried to pull back his blood soaked shirt to examine the wound he moaned in pain and his eyes opened.

“Howdy ma’am,” he said in a bare whisper “Fancy seeing you here.”

“How are you?”

“How do I look?”

“Not good. We need to find out if he reloaded the research data then get you out of here.”

“He didn’t, I was with him ever since we got back. The data storage is right there in his desk. Damn fool, like most people, thinks his desk is safe.”

Raid opened the drawer to the desk and pulled her data storage device out. “He is right, its right here. I can see they have not broken my locking code yet. He was probably planning on keeping it with him until they got it deciphered.”

“I don’t care why, lets just get out of here.”

“Oh shock,” Nickleback said looking out the window. Look at that!”

Looking out the window they saw the carnage that the Assault had wrought. Out of hidden bunker doors Ranger commandos were filling the grounds and air strike units were launching. The fallen Titan was being looked at by its standing companion and repair crews scrambled over its armored shell.

“How the hell do we get past all of that?” Nickleback wondered.

“I don’t know.” Sigma stated bluntly.

In his whispering voice Hangfire said, “I can drive you.”

“I don’t think you are up to it cowboy, but the truck may be the best way. Nickleback get over here and lets carry him out.” But as they started to lift him, Hangfire could not take the pain.

“Please don’t move me. It hurts worse when I move. I can fly you out by remote; the truck has a sat relay built in. Just find it, and I will get you out.”

“We cannot just leave you, you will die here.”

“I am dying already darlin’ I just want to fix what I done. Just hurry, I don’t know how long I can hang in.”

“Why” Raid asked with simplicity.

“They had some of my kin at gunpoint” Sigma, Raid and Nickleback took turns nodding and meeting the dying man’s eyes.

They all left on quick feet carefully looking for guards. “I guess I underestimated him again,” Nickleback whispered.

**

The remaining Titan stood straight and turned slowly, and began to walk slowly over to the building. Anyone that was watching closely enough would have detected strangeness to the gait of the robot as it moved. Closer and closer it moved to the building until finally it stood facing the red metal and reflective glass exterior staring at its own reflection. Slowly a small panel in the chest near the neck of the robot opened and inside was the cockpit of the behemoth. Three men sat terrified and strapped into the command chairs of the robot, with their hands now waving over their head. In the center of the cockpit straddling a hole ripped in the floor of the chamber stood a crouched over AG3.

The AG3 delivered a mild stunning field to the pilots who then slumped over unconscious. Walking as far as the edge of the chamber would allow it leaped towards the reinforced plasteel window before it. The window bulged momentarily then shattered into a million pieces and the AG3 found itself in an empty mid level executive office. It reached down and pushed the desk out of its way and began to stride into the room when its sensors detected someone coming in the window behind him. Turning he looked at Luis who smiled and jabbed a thumb back over his own shoulder. “Flying units are getting pretty nasty out there, but you have confused the hell out of them Amigo. They are all trying to figure out what the robot is doing standing next to the tower and not answering calls. Mind if I come in with you?”

::YOUR PRESENCE IS NOT IN THE PARAMETERS OF MY MISSION::

“You will never know I am here,” said Luis smiling.

::LOCATION OF TEAM MEMBERS LOCKED, PROCEEDING TO RALLY WITH THEM::

**

They stood in the parking garage of one of the rear cargo bays of the building, near where they had entered just the night before. The truck was parked there, and Nickleback was trying to get the drivers compartment door open. “It’s locked, now what do we do?”

“You are thinking about this like you are going to drive,” Raid answered, walking up to the front of the truck, where she knew one of the stronger sensor arrays was located. “Hangfire it’s us, open up the doors!” she called out waiving her arms. The doors of the truck unlocked with an audible click and the engine systems lit up, with the mag-lift system taking on a deeper hum.

Raid smiled with victory at Nickleback who looked very much as if he wanted to stick his tongue out at her. When they were about to board was when the door opened to the chamber. Nickleback began his attack without thought and was shocked when his sword bounced off the glassy skin of the AG3.

::YOUR ATTACK IS NOT NEEDED NICKLEBACK. I HAVE COME TO RALLY WITH THE TEAM::

“Shock you fishbowl,” Nickleback said as he grabbed his wrists that still stung from the reverberation of the strike.

“I am glad to see you AG3, we will need your firepower to get past the large robot out there,” said Sigma.

::THAT TARGET HAS ALREADY BEEN ELIMINATED::

“Both of them?”

::AFFIRMATIVE::

“Shock, that is the best news we have had all day. Where have you been since Hangfire brought us back?”

::THIS UNIT WAS DROPPED IN THE OUTLANDS, AND RETURNED TO ASSIST TEAM LEADER SIGMA::

“Dropped? Hangfire must have hoped this would happen then. How did you get here so fast though?”

::THIS UNIT WAS ASSISTED BY SELF IDENTIFIED HERO LUIS AKA DUST DEVIL::

“Hero?”

::AFFIRMATIVE::

Oh this is just what we need, Sigma thought to herself. “AG3, you take your orders from Raid until I get back. I want you all on that truck and ready to leave when I get back. I just hope I make it in time.”

“Where are you going?” Raid asked

“We don’t need another hero,” Sigma replied loading her weapon.

**

Lee stood with his hands in the air. The room was chaos with people and furniture scattered by the winds that were now settling. His hat had been blown off and his white beard was in disarray, his eyes stung with the wind that had blown.

“Who the hell are you?” he asked the man in the poncho.

“They call me the Dust Devil. Sound familiar?”

“I…” Lee stammered “I didn’t do that to those people on purpose. It is not fault they were in the test area.”

“You bastard! They were squatters just looking for a place to live, and you and your scum friends in Mexico City killed them all! I had friends and family in that camp, do you understand that, friends and family! YOU AND YOUR COMPANY HAVE SEEN THEIR LAST DAY! FIRST I AM GOING TO KILL YOU, THEN WIPE OUT EVERY COMPUTER, EVERY CREDIT YOU HAVE EVER HAD!” Luis pulled a laser pistol from the folds of the poncho and aimed at the older mans head. He was about to squeeze the trigger when a voice spoke out from behind him.

“I cannot allow you to do that.”

Angrily Luis turned and faced the black woman with her hair in beads. “Who are you, one of his whores!?”

“No. You came in here with my robot, and that makes you my responsibility. I came to do a specific thing, and you are overstepping that boundary. Come with me now and I will make sure you get safely home to Mexico.”

“I am sorry, but I have a job to do, and you cannot stop me!” Luis spun quickly and pulled the trigger of the gun. Sigma reached out into the probabilities. She was unable to effect people directly, or it would have been easy to move Lee out of the way. But Dust Devil was around a lot of sand, since there were several probabilities in which a small particle had scratched the focusing agent of the laser and…

The gun flashed and burnt up in Luis’ hand, and he was forced to drop the pistol to the floor where it bounced off the command center’s metal flooring.

“You did this!” he shouted at Sigma and charged at her, the wind in the large control room beginning to stir. People never expect some things, and Luis certainly never expected the woman to actually shoot him, but the gun rose and the pulse reached out and jarred Luis from head to toe. Falling to his knees Luis wavered and tried not to fall over.

“Who the hell are you!” Lee demanded, suddenly brave in the face of the smaller woman. “Your robot! You did this all. I will be next to ruined! Who put you up to this tell me now!” He put his hand under his coat and once again reached for the six-shooter.

**

Raid had the AG3 lay down on its custom table and power down to minimum levels. Nickleback was in the front cab of the truck keeping an eye out for Sigma. Raid talked to herself as she looked for a data port.

“It has to be here somewhere. You have to have a way to up and download data. Now where is it? Dammit show me!”

Obediently the AG3 opened a small door in its head, which flipped back to show the data port below.

“Jackpot!” Raid said as she reached into her pocket for an adapter for her datajack. She would download the data into her internal drives to analyze later. That was her specialty after all. She had earned her reputation stealing personality algorithms and operations programming from other robots and their manufacturers the world over.

**

Casually Sigma thumbed a switch on her gun and a lance of heat shot from the barrel and into the knee of Lee who began screaming in pain and dropped the gun. He rolled around on the floor howling and sobbing as a stunned Luis began to come back to some form of alertness in part from all the noise.

Sigma walked over to Lee and placed her red boot on his chest, stopping his rolling. “Then I suggest you resign from Southern Life. Immediately. But first you will order a large amount of money to be sent to the people that were killed in the squat, and you will make sure Hangfire’s family is retired with a large pension to some far away corner of this state never to be bothered again.”

“You are crazy!”

“Am I?” Sigma said placing the barrel of her gun against the other knee of Lee and smiling at him. “I don’t think I am.” The beads in her hair clicked as they collided together when she shook her head.

“Ok, Ok, if that’s what y’all want!”

“I do, and don’t think I cannot find you if I want to. I will be checking.” She turned to the Dust Devil. “Does that satisfy you?”

“No.”

“Too bad. Get the hell out, and if you come back here to Texas I will have to hunt you down as well.”

With a scowl to Sigma, Luis walked to the window and opened it. “We will see” he said and launched himself out of the window and flew away poncho flapping.

Sigma walked to the window to watch him go, careful to kick Lee’s gun further away as she did. After Luis became a distant dot in the sky she said over her shoulder, “Now lets see about getting your dogs called off.” But as she turned she saw the sweaty Samuel Houston Lee had passed out in shock. It then hit her how bad of a condition Hangfire, just in the next room, must be in and she ran off as fast as she could go.

**

Sigma hurriedly jumped into the truck and slammed the door. Nickleback sat next to her and she guessed Raid and the Assault were in the rear. To her the lights of the truck were not as bright as they were when she left. “I’m in Hangfire, lets get out of here.” Armored plating slid down like scales over the windows, then a small missile tube launched a small stinger that evaporated the door. Two boosting jets slid out of hidden compartments on the underside of the truck, and switching from mag-lift to anti-grav the rockets fired a deep violet flame and the passengers of the truck were pushed back into their seats as the vehicle launched from the garage. The Air Ranger units did not have a chance and only one got off a missing shot as the truck quickly faded into the distance.

**

In the deserted areas of Oklahoma, out of the reach of the Rangers, Sigma began to notice the strangeness to the engines. The lights, the generators, the engines were pulsing in an odd pattern. Pulse, pulse, off. Pulse, pulse, off. The pattern of it tickled at her mind but she could not place it. Nickleback sat alert and staring out the window at the desert racing by. The truck began to slow as they neared the outskirts of Oklahoma City, speed falling off rapidly as the lights became dimmer and dimmer. Pulse, pulse, off. The pauses became longer and longer. The spaces between pulses became longer and longer. The truck finally came to a stop and hovered in place.

“It’s a heartbeat isn’t it?” Sigma asked.

Nickleback nodded soberly. “A dying heart. I have heard them before, but not like this.”

The doors opened to the truck, and they all climbed out and walked a pace away and turned to watch. Pulse……pulse…………

The lights went out completely and the power supply shut, the gap of the anti-grav cushion deflated and the truck hit the ground. In silence they watched before finally Nickleback said in a quiet voice. “I feel the engine rev like it’s my heart and I could control the guns and armor systems as sure as you can use your hands”

**

Sigma and the AG3 stood in a Washington DC cemetery near the grave of some long dead Senator and would be President wrapped against the cold wind. At least it was cold to Sigma, who pulled her coat close and waited for the guest to arrive. The AG3 was wearing an oversized long coat and clothing, a knitted hat and face wrapped in a scarf, Gloves on its hands completed the wardrobe and covered almost everything. It was not enough and the large robot still stood out. Finally after seeming endless waiting the door opened on a tomb near them, and dressed in a fur trimmed coat, out stepped the lightly lined face of Madison Dazmary. She walked over to them and smiled.

“Were you a success?”

“We were,” Sigma said handing over the data storage device. “But we lost the truck and Hangfire. I made sure the truck was disposed of, but I do not know what happened to Hangfire’s body. The last I saw it was in Dallas. The complete report is on this chip.” She placed the chip over to Madison’s gloved hand.

“He cannot be traced back to us, but it’s a shame none the less. I hate to lose a good asset like that.” Seeing Sigma scowl Madison added, “You know I don’t mean it to sound so cold.”

“You never do Maddy.”

Looking at the AG3, Madison finally decided to break the rule of secrecy. “Kiwana, are you ready to do another mission for me?”

Kiwana looked at Madison in the eyes, and a smile touched her lips but not her eyes as much. “In a few days Maddy, I need some time off first.” She began to walk away to her lingering sky-car. Madison did not wait for her to climb in before trailed by the AG3 she walked back to the tomb. Closing the door once they were both inside she punched in the codes to lower them down to the tunnel system far below.

“How does she do it? That is what I have never figured out,” Madison mused to herself forgetting she was not alone.

::SHE IS NOT A MUTANT::

Looking up to the disguised robot towering over her, Madison smiled and said, “That much I already know.”

**

:::Transverse City, two days later::

Raid sat staring at the screens in disbelief, reviewing the data she had stolen from the Assault robot. On a red-lit screen to her left a series of numbers scrolled by, and on her right green numbers scrolled by almost identically to the first. Her eyes wide Raid mumbled to herself, “What the hell are they thinking?”

An innocent screen in blue, the child of the red and green screens, pulsed a message across its backlit display.

::DATAMATCH CONFIRMED. THE AG3 INTELLIGENCE IS BUILT ON THE NIMROD PROGRAM KERNEL::

~FIN~