By: Sterling
187295 slowly awoke. He blinked and saw only darkness. It did not register, since his mind was blank. Then knowledge slowly began to unfold inside his head. He was a clone in the service of the Arm in its fight against the horrible atrocity known as patterning. The fact that his mind was being downloaded into his body through a very similar process did not even register.
More knowledge unfolded. He was a vehicle pilot, and his donor had been a specialist in the light attack vehicles the Arm favoured. More memories unfolded. Some were blocked off, the memories of his life before he donated his DNA. Growing up on the frontier world of Terence-15, his parents and family. One memory came up that he couldn't wait to have blacked out.
He was piloting a hover skimmer on a routine sweep, watching for wild and dangerous animals on his family's lands. He was also charting the newly terraformed terrain and practising a few stunts. At the time, every frontier lad's dream was to become good enough to be shipped off to the Core Space Authority Academy and train to become a starfighter pilot.
He'd seen five bright specks of light descending towards his family's homestead. He didn't know at the time, but they were Core assault dropships. The War that would reduce the galaxy to ruins had begun.
He got home just in time to see the Core Valkyries lift off, carrying their horrible loads of Armoured Killers (A-Ks) and Core foot soldiers. His home was burned to the ground. The bodies of his father and brothers were strewn over the ground. His mother and two sisters were slumped in chairs in the living room, lifeless.
The next day, he and all the other survivors of the Core raid contacted the nearest Arm recruiting station. He'd never looked back.
The memory vanished, and all that remained was a soldier. A man with a minimal set of memories, since downloading had not yet been perfected and a full set could drive someone insane. He had no knowledge about how to fight, but knew he had to. The soulless computers of the Core had to be wiped out, destroyed utterly, removed from existence. All that could and wanted to were to be transferred back to organic bodies and the rest were to be erased.
Light flooded his existence, forcing him to raise what his mind said was a hand to cover his eyes. A voice spoke.
It said, "This one is one slow riser! Come on, get up kid. We've got to get you fitted for a biosuit and a Jeffy."
187295 blinked and slowly sat up. He gripped the edge of his cloning pod (which his mind seemed to think was very like a coffin) and pulled himself to his feet.
He almost fell over again. Something was wrong with his balance. Something caught him, and he realized that the gravity here was less than it was when his DNA had been read. Or when his donor's DNA had been read. The hands helped him to his feet. He looked around and saw that it was a young woman... Who looked kind of like someone he once knew...
But his memory blocks were too good. He couldn't remember who it was. She shook her head. "Another good clone wasted for this war. Ah, well. Right through that door over there, kid."
She pointed him towards the door. It was actually only an opening in and otherwise featureless metal wall, with a conveyor belt leading who knows where?
He shook his head, reluctant to face the unknown. He was, after all, less than five minutes old. But the woman gave him a gentle push and he stepped onto the conveyor. The last thing he heard her say was, "What a waste..."
The scanners were sweeping over his body. Taking measurements, physical readouts, medical data, metal performance. Less than a minute later, he was transferred onto another conveyor. A wash of green fog swept over him. He didn't know what it was, but it was placing something over his skin. The fog vanished and the conveyor moved on.
He looked down. His body was covered by some kind of tight-fitting jumpsuit. It felt different, though. Almost as if it were a part of his body. He tried a few experimental movements, and found that it somehow enhanced his responsiveness and strength. The conveyor ended suddenly and he was dumped unceremoniously onto the floor. He quickly picked himself up, and saw what he assumed were other clones standing around. All were wearing the strange bodysuits and none seemed to know what was going on.
The door he had come from vanished with a whoosh. A door at the other end opened, and someone strode in.
"Attention!" the strange man shouted. "I am Training Sergeant Denson, of the Arm resistance movement, 347th cadre. You are my men. Over the next month, I will be training you in the operation of the primary Arm light strike vehicles, the Flash and Jeffy."
Everyone still had enough of their old training left to snap to attention as Sergeant Denson began to speak. As Denson spoke, he moved among the clones, arranging them into ranks.
"These vehicles are the latest in advanced technology. To our knowledge, the Core has had only minimal success in duplicating these vehicles, so we expect them to be very useful in the coming war. But don't worry. No matter what anyone tells you, it will all be over by YearsEnd."
He walked up to the front of the newly arranged training cadre. "347th Arm Resistance Training Cadre, stand at ease!"
Everyone remembered that command as well. Denson too went to ease, and began speaking again.
"But first, about those bodysuits you are wearing. They too are the latest in Arm technology. They are a combination of the memcomposite which allows our heavy assault PeeWee Kbots to function, a high-tech nanomedkit, a damage-resistant material, and biological material. The biosuit acts as an extension of your body, giving you greatly increased strength, speed, healing, and response to Direct Neural Control systems. You will wear your biosuits at all times in the field, and are only permitted to remove them in barracks. Even then, keep it close at hand."
Another door slid open as Denson finished his speech. "Move through that door single-file. You'll be measured for the Jeffy combat cars we'll be using for training, then your cars will be nanolathed. You'll have a few hours of rest while they're being 'lathed, then we'll begin training proper." Denson drew himself to attention and the 347th followed. "347th training cadre, in single file, march!"
The cadre turned and marched through the door. 187295 was in the middle, and could see the people in front and behind being scanned. Then the conveyor moved on and the strange light of the scanner was sweeping over him. This conveyor ended just as suddenly as the previous one. One second, he was standing on it travelling along, the next he was sitting on the floor in a pile. He stood up and looked around. It took him a second to recognize where he was.
His surroundings slowly became familiar. He was in an Arm barracks. That much was easy to tell, since there were bunks standing all over the place. But this place was different from the barracks he could dimly remember. Those had been 'brighter' somehow. They hadn't looked so... drab. So replicated.
He moved aside just in time for another clone to get dumped onto the ground. There were... a lot of bunks here. Too many to count. He wasn't sure which one was his, or even how to tell.
Then he saw the woman from the cloning chamber. Or was it a clone of her? Or was the one from the cloning chamber a clone of this one? A quick shake cleared his head. It didn't matter. She was holding a clipboard, and might be able to help him.
She looked up as he walked over and smiled. "Ah, yes. 187295." She looked down at her clipboard. "You're assigned to bunk 754." She winked at him and smiled. "Right below mine."
He blushed. He was sure that had some significance, but couldn't remember what it was. At least he had one friend. And he'd been alive less than an hour. Suddenly, he felt very tired. It only took him a couple of minutes to find bunk 754. He collapsed into it and was asleep almost instantly.
[Top]
The next morning, all the cadets were woken early and herded outside after minimal time to freshen up and eat. They didn't need to freshen up, since their biosuits' nanobots kept their skin clean, their bloodstream free of disease, and their teeth clean. But they still had some old habits left over.
The cadets did need to eat. Scientists had yet to develop a nanobot that could keep a person fed, although they were working on it. The Arm was well aware that their troops need for food and water would be a major problem. Breakthroughs had been made, but they required a Kbot or other vehicle of some kind to be installed in. So the ordinary foot soldier and clones that hadn't yet been assigned a vehicle still needed to eat.
They stood around outside for a while. From what 187295 could see, this planet looked like a desert world. Bleak landscapes of sand dunes stretched out on all sides for as far as he could see. The sun burned brightly in the sky overhead. The air was hot, he was sure, but his biosuit was keeping him cool. Arm science was indeed marvellous!
Finally, Training Sergeant Denson stomped around the edge of the building, muttering to himself. From what 187295 could hear, someone had screwed up the orders. Either Denson or the training cadre had been sent to the wrong place. Arm science may indeed be marvellous, but its bureaucracy was the same as everywhere else.
Denson lead the 347th around the edge of the building, and every single clone gasped. Sitting there, gleaming in the sunlight, were fifty Jeffy combat cars. Jeffys were widely acknowledged to be the fastest and most manoeuvrable combat cars in existence. The Core Weasels were almost as good, but the Jeffys had been in development for a lot longer.
Denson grinned, "Don't be getting too excited. These are training models. The laser cannon has been replaced with a targeting laser. You've got the same heavy armour generators as the combat models, though. Go ahead. Pick a car and climb in."
The entire 347th cadre broke and ran to the Jeffys. Everyone had a car picked out, and everyone got the car they wanted. The access hatches responded to their fingerprints and cycled open. But the inside of the Jeffy was like no car 187295 had ever seen.
The driver's compartment was a lot smaller, for a start. It barely looked large enough for the driver's seat and the controls which surrounded it. The controls looked mostly like those on an ordinary car, except for a couple of things. There was some kind of extra control stick and firing button that looked like it operated the laser. And there was a strange arrangement of hookups around the chair. They seemed to correspond to hookups on his biosuit, but 187295 couldn't imagine what they were for. There was also a strange helmet.
With a shrug, 187295 dropped himself into the combat car and buckled himself into the seat. He reached forwards for the ignition key, but Denson's voice stopped him. He glanced over towards the comm display, and saw that Denson was speaking to the entire 347th.
"I know you're all probably reaching for the ignition keys right now. Don't touch them! Instead, press the button on the other side of the steering wheel."
187295 shrugged again and pressed the button Denson had talked about. A panel he didn't recognize came alive, and strange patterns began dancing over it. The hookups swivelled around and attached to his suit. He blinked, then the helmet was covering his head. A pleasant sensation washed over him, then his sense of self expanded.
He was still sitting in the driver's seat, and could still control his body. He could raise his hand and see it through the helmet's viewport. But he also felt as if he were the Jeffy combat car. He could feel the wheels slowly pressing into the sand, feel the motor inactive under the hood, feel the heavy armour generator pulsing. Experimentally, he twisted his laser turret and grinned. His vision had expanded as well. He could now see quite a long distance and all around him, thanks to the car's sensors.
"That sensation you experienced a few moments ago was the interface adapting itself to your mind. You should now be feeling like you are the combat car. Do you see the tank that is to the rear of your formation?" Denson's voice seemed to come into his mind instead of through his ears.
187295 could see the tank. As he focused on it, he felt his turret swivel around towards it. Suddenly, without thinking about it, he knew that tank was a Flash Assault Tank. It was armed with a pair of cutting-edge Energy Machine Guns (or EMGs) and was almost as fast as his Jeffy. His computer informed him that his chances of surviving an engagement were approximately 0%.
"That is me," Denson continued. "This Flash tank will be my transport while I make you bunch of protoplasmic bunches of organic matter into Arm warriors. While my weapons are currently set down to simulation mode, I am able to switch them to combat mode. If any of you tries to desert or damage Arm property, I will not hesitate to destroy you. And since about a second and a half of fire from my EMGs will reduce your combat cars to so much rubble, you won't be able to escape. Now, shall we get on with our training?"
187295 gunned his engine and laughed as the Jeffy leapt of the top of a dune. Sand sprayed all over the surrounding ground. The car landed with a jolt and he put it into a tight turn, spraying more sand. The wheels spun briefly, then he was off again. The car stood up on two wheels for a second as he pulled a tight turn around a dune.
With the enhanced vision the combat car's sensors gave him, he could see the other trainees. Most were performing the same stunts he was. A couple were racing and one or two were engaging in mock combats with their laser turrets. They'd discovered early on that a 'hit' from one of the targeting lasers froze the car in question for a few seconds.
Denson's voice spoke in his head again. He'd almost grown used to the feeling of someone else speaking into his mind, but it still unnerved him.
"Alright, 347th, listen up. We are now far out of visual or sensor range of Camp. Since you will rarely be operating close to base, unless the Core gets aggressive, you'll need to learn how to find your way around. I want you to reach out with your minds and think of a map."
187295 did as Denson ordered. He was surprised as a map suddenly appeared in his field of vision. It didn't block anything out, but he could still see it. It was like he was looking at two things at once and was very disorienting. He slammed on the breaks and stopped.
Denson chuckled as the entire 347th did the same thing. "A natural reaction. Don't be embarrassed. That's one of the advantages of a Direct Neural Control. You can see several things at once."
187295 found that he could still control the car, look at what was going on around him, and look at the map at the same time. It was a strange feeling, but he liked it. He pulled a few manoeuvres as Denson talked and studied the map. It showed him the surrounding terrain. He was in the middle, and Camp was at one edge. Most of the terrain was greyed out, but some was shown in colour.
"Since Camp has been established for a while and we have a couple of survey satellites, we know what the surrounding terrain looks like. If you're on a planet and don't have access to the maps, unexplored terrain will be shown in black. The areas in colour are the ones that are currently within the sensor radius of a unit linked into the base's data collection and analysis systems."
187295 looked up in amazement as he heard the sound of thrusters. A brand-new Atlas aerial transport was hovering overhead and lowering down over Denson's tank. Denson continued speaking as the Atlas grabbed his tank and lifted up into the sky.
"One further thing. You can get the map to tell you distances just by asking for them. I want everyone back at Camp by nightfall. Anyone who arrives later than 22:00 will be reassigned. I hope to see you all back at camp."
It took 187295 less than five minutes to get the hang of using his nav map. He noticed that during the day, they had somehow managed to travel almost four hundred kilometres from the base. At maximum speed over flat ground, it would take him about two hours to get there. He turned towards the base and set out. Whatever happened, he knew that he probably wouldn't survive 'reassignment.'
[Top]
187295's Jeffy sped through the camp gates and screeched to a halt fifteen minutes before Denson's deadline. He'd set a route that gave him an hour's margin for error and was glad of it. He'd gotten turned around at one tight point, which had cost him ten minutes and tried a shortcut through a cave system, which had cost him the other thirty-five.
A thought command shut down the Jeffy. He felt the hookups to his biosuit retract, then his expanded awareness dimmed down again. Finally, when the last of the Jeffy's systems shut down, he was back to his own self. He flexed a hand then reached up and popped the Jeffy's canopy. Another Jeffy sped though the gate and screeched to a halt. 187295 waited, interested to see who it was.
The Jeffy's lights shut down and the vehicle seemed to change somehow as its heavy armour generators shut down. The canopy opened and another male clone stepped out.
187295's jaw almost dropped open in shock. At first glance, the clone looked exactly like Sergeant Denson. But as he looked closer, 187295 noticed minute differences. The clone's face was less worn and he didn't look as experienced or as tough as Denson. His hair was slightly different too. And there ws something about the Clone's eyes, something that didn't quite convey the same message as Denson's eyes.
The clone looked at 187295 closely. "So you're the pilot of that Jeffy. You're good. One of the best in the cadre, I'd say."
187295 blinked and looked down a bit at the compliment. Vehicle control seemed to come natually to him, but for the life of him he couldn't remember why. As he looked up again the clone was smiling.
"Embarrased, eh? Don't be." the clone smiled. "I'm pretty good myself, and I had a hard time following you home." 187295 blinked. That sounded a lot like cheating to him.
The clone laughed. "I know what you're thinking. But from what I can tell, that's what this excercise is designed to weed out. Out there, we're supposed to work like a team. So those that can navigate do, and the others follow. We're supposed to do that. And those that can't figure it out, they get... reassigned."
187295 smiled. "You look a lot like the Sergeant."
The clone nodded. "As far as I can tell, I'm cloned from the Sergeant's genes. Can't find out for sure, though. Anyways, I'm 165937. And you are?"
187295 held out his hand. "187295."
165937 shook it. "Well, let's head back into the barracks, see if we can get some food and find something to do until tomorrow."
187295 nodded and followed his newfound friend inside.
The barracks was a bustle of noise. Another training cadre had come back from survival operations elsewheres on the planet, and many of the new clones were gathered around them, listening to their tales. Other groups of clones were gathered in small groups, talking or playing games of one kind or another.
As they walked through the barracks, 187295 caught sight of the woman who he'd met in the cloning chamber and later in the barracks. She was sitting by her bunk with a group of other females, playing some sort of card game. On impulse, 187295 turned towards her. 165937 followed.
She looked up as he approached and smiled. "Welcome back, soldier. Have a seat. Know how to play Silessian Trumps?"
He started to say "No," but knowledge began to unfold in his head. He suddenly knew the rules, and knew that his donor had been a fairly good Silessian Trumps player. He was puzzled for a second, then shrugged mentally. Why not?
"Sure," he said, and sat down beside her.
She held out a hand. "175896. I already know your ID and the ID of your friend."
187295 looked at her, trying to figure out how she knew that.
175896 laughed. "I'm one of the second-cycle officer clones. Apparently my donor's genes were special enough that all her clones are officer material. Right now I'm on admin duty. When I finally get a combat posting and a full designation, I'll probably be assigned to one of the new Rocko suits, or a 'LatheBot, or something like that. Who knows? I could even be driving a heavy combat car in command of your unit." She winked at him, then turned towards one of the other clones. "Alright, 200154, its your deal."
187295 blushed as she winked at him. She seemed a lot more advanced than he was. Perhaps, someday, he'd ask her what those winks ment. Or he'd figure out for himself, or something. But no time soon.
187295 looked at the cards he'd been delt. He watched in surprise as what looked like a random arrangment of cards changed into a three-moon hand. He was aware, somewhere in the back of his mind, that the hand was still the same. But the way he was viewing it changed. Then the game swept him away, exchanging cards and improving his hand.
An hour later, 187295 had won three-quarters of the hands he played. The other players had finally given up and wandered off, and he and 165937 and 175896 had headed off to see what other recreational faculties were available to clones during off-hours. They found several areas that were off-limits to clones, available only to natural-born officers-in-training. Then they stumbled upon Sterr's.
Sterr, according to rumor, had been one of the instigators of the Arm rebellion. At the time he'd been 76. Middle-aged by the standards of most worlds, but too old for fighting. As the Arm gained support and ground, he was offered nanoenhancement and a command position, where his tactical genius could be put to use. He turned them down, and instead elected to open a bar on this world, whatever it was.
Inside, multi-coloured lights and strobes flashed, low-power lasers cut through smoke over the dance floor. The rest of the bar was fairly dark. Drones served the drinks, but all the drinks were poured and mixed by Sterr. Even though he was now almost 200, he was maintained by several nanolathes. It was the only thing he would let the Arm do for him. Loud music could be heard on the dance floor, but here in the bar area, the music was muted by sonic dampners.
They found a table and sat down. A drone took their orders and sped off to inform Sterr. The three looked and each other, and they all grinned.
"I can't believe so many people are back in the barracks," 165937 said. "With a place like this, who would want to hang around there?"
175896 laughed, "This place doesn't actually 'officially' exist. Its just that none of the officers have the guts to stand up to Sterr. According to legend, he took on a Core infantry bot with his bare hands and won. I didn't know this place existed until tonight."
Then the drone returned. Or was it another one? Who could tell. It set their drinks down on the table and scooted off into the semi-darkness of the bar. 187295 raised his glass and took a sip. The drink tasted strange. But familiar, somehow. As if he'd had it before. But how was that possible? He was barely a day old.
The rest of the time before lights-out passed in a blur. He and his new friends talked about many things. Life here at the Camp, what training was like, the rebellion against the Core, and the exciting new scientific breakthroughs coming every day that would allow them to beat the Core before the end of the year. He and 175896 had danced several times. At lights-out, he dragged himself into his bunk and collapsed. He was asleep within seconds.
[Top]
"Alright, scubs, listen up!" Sergeant Denson's voice startled 187295 back to awareness. He'd been daydreaming. He hastily checked his vehicle's status. With a sigh of relief, he saw that he was right where he was supposed to be.
When they climbed into their vehicles that morning, after almost a week of manvouers, vehicle handling, and navigation training, they'd each recieved orders to move to specific points. En route, 187295 noticed that about half the cadre was following him, and the other half had split off, heading away. He'd also noticed that his map didn't report the positions or sensor data from the units in the other half.
"Today, we're going to be playing a little war game," Denson's voice continued. "Half of the cadre is on one side, and the other half is on the other. You are currently about fifty kilometers apart. The objective of this game is simple. Destroy the other side. As the games go on, we'll add more objectives."
"Now, just so you know, when you get hit with a targeting laser, you're 'out.' Your car will be immobilized and your controls de-activated. Remember that you can be destroyed by friendly fire. And that destroyed cars will just sit there, just like wreckage in a real battle. Now, go to it. Your computers know who has been assigned to squad command positions, and who is in charge of each team. Note that your team commanders aren't part of your training cadre, but have been drawn from our officer training pool."
187295 blinked in surprise as he saw the name of his commanding officer. It was 175896! He wasn't a squad commander, which caused him minor disappointment, but at least his team was in good hands. Then his navcomp flickered to life. His squad was being ordered to recon for the enemy attack that was sure to come. He sighed and gunned his engine to life.
Minutes later, he lept his Jeffy off the top of a dune. The enemy commander hadn't used particularly inventive strategy. He'd moved half his force forwards in one large wave. The other half was engaged in some sort of flanking attack, as had been reported by the other two scout teams.
An explosion sound told him that someone had been disabled. Then a Jeffy rounded the corner of a dune, standing up on two wheels as the driver pulled a turn that was a bit too tight. He twisted his turret around and swept his targeting laser over the enemy. His target screeched to a halt as all his systems locked up, and 187295 quickly turned around him, speeding back towards friendly lines as fast as he could go.
Targeting lasers swept over the sand behind him as he lept another dune. The showers of sand that his course was causing were actually helping. The lasers that got through the sand were too weak for his computer to pick up as a hit. He'd have to remember that for future use.
The he saw a cloud of sand ahead. His sensors picked up a group of friendly Jeffys. About a third of his team. Enough to give him some safty, but not enought to take on the force coming for them. He twisted his combat car through a tight turn and matched speed and vector with the front line of the friendlies.
As they swept towards the enemy cars, new orders arrived from his squad commander. Upon contact, they were not to try to maintain their formation. In fact, just before contact with the enemy, they were to split up. To 187295, this seemed like madness at first. All the individual cars would be cut to pieces by the well-organized enemy. But as he thought about it, the plan seemed to make more sense. While they were focusing on one car, the other cars would be able to do a lot of damage to the enemy. And their lack of formation ment they'd be a lot harder to hit or predict.
Then the enemy was upon them, and their formation disintigrated. Combat cars sped off in every direction, curving back around to attack. 187295 twisted his car, blazing away at the enemy with his laser. Then he turned, kicking up a spray of sand as he did so, and sped away. Targeting lasers lit up the sand all around him. Wildly weaving, he turned around and prepared to fire again.
He noticed another advantage of his team's dispersed formation. Since they were spread out, they could easily manouver around 'dead' Jeffys. But since his opponents were clustered together fairly tightly, they had to slow down and manouver around dead comrades. That made them even better targets.
Picking out three who had slowed down to turn, 187295 fired at them as quickly as his laser could recharge. Two simply stopped as normal, but the third hit an already disabled comrade and flipped into the air. It landed and rolled. The heavy armour easily took the punishment, but the car would still require some nanorepair after the wargames.
Finally, all the enemy Jeffys were disabled. 187295 stopped his car, letting the systems cool from the strains of combat. They were supposed to be able to withstand combat conditions for up to a week without problems, but he still liked to be cautious.
His orders computer activated again. The team on the left wing had followed orders and won the battle easily. But the team on the right wing had stayed together in formation and been slaughtered by the enemy, who did split up. He sighed and fired up his engine again. This battle would probably be a bit more difficult. They were ordered to come in without any kind of formation, as the position of the enemy was uncertain.
After ten minutes of searching, they found the enemy. 187295 was in the middle of the group, and survived the first contact with the enemy scout force. The lead elements weren't so lucky, and many of them were disabled.
He tipped his Jeffy up on two wheels as he took a turn around the edge of a dune, executing a miniature flanking manouver against the enemy. His laser stabbed out, barely missing an enemy Jeffy. He zig-zagged, and the enemy's laser missed him as well. A quick turn brought him back around and he searched for his foe, not noticing or caring about the spray of sand kicked up behind him.
It wasn't there. He caught sight of movement behind a dune and threw his Jeffy into a skid. The volley of laser shots fired by his enemy barely missed, but his return fire was right on target. The enemy screeched to a halt and 187295 took off in a shower of sand and a squeel of tires, looking for more targets.
Then something belew up behind him. He fought an urge to slam on the breaks and used his turret to look around. An enemy Jeffy sat there, disabled by a teamate who had been watching his back. The teamate's lights flickered on and off, and his comm activated. It was 175896!
"Gotta learn to watch your back, ace! Never concentrate on one target! The only reason you're still alive is because of that sand spray trick of yours." He winced at the reprimand, then blinked in surprise as his combat computer shut off. His sensors restored to full power too, showing the sensor data of the former enemy.
"Alright, 347th! Excellent exercise! I trust everyone has learned something from this. Namely, never, ever stay in a tight formation. Stay flexible. Keep moving as fast as possible and along hard-to-track paths. And maybe you'll survive your first battle. Everyone head back to base. You've got 24 hours R&R. You've earned it. Phase one of your training is almost over."
[Top]
The 347th cadre again assembled in front of the main camp structure. This time, both they and Sergeant Denson had been given the correct orders. The sky was still dark, so they could only see the outlines of the people around them. Denson was the only one they could see in any detail, since he was in the center of a spotlight. The desert was cold at night, and many of the clones were shivering even in their biosuits.
Denson straigthened up and spoke, "347th Arm Resistance Training Cadre, Attention!" The cadre snapped to attention, each member responding automatically to the spoken command. "Today, you begin the next phase of your training. By now, you have all the basic skills needed to take on the soulless Core enemy. Now we see if your training has given you the stuff that will let you survive out there in the field.
"Each of you will be dropped at a place out in the northern forests. You will have to survive there for two days. You will be given basic survival equipment, of the kind that might be found in a Jeffy combat car. At the end of two days, you will be picked up by one of our Hercules Infantry Transport Aircraft. Only half of you are expected to survive this mission. Good luck."
Then Denson turned and walked back into the base. With a whine of thrusters, five Hercules ITAs landed. Their cargo doors opened and a corporal stepped out of each one. They began shouting numbers, and the clones of the 347th cadre lined up and filled into the transports. All were solenm. This could be the last time they saw some of their friends.
187295 leaned back in the webbing. All Hercules ITAs used webbing for infantry seating instead of proper chairs. It was cheaper to nanolathe, more resistant to damage, and could adapt its shape to the form and equipment of the infantry sitting in it.
All he had heard for the last hour was the roar of thruster fire. The transport was now moving close to four times the speed of sound, and was almost halfway to the northern forests where they were to be dropped. A corporal was moving between the men, distributing Arm Field Survival Kit 56-C. It could have been the same corporal as earlier, or a different one. 187295 didn't know, or care. To him, the entire crew of this transport looked alike. Perhaps they were.
Arm Feild Survival Kit 56-C was a very basic kit. As Denson said, it was very similar to the ones installed in Jeffys in case of a crash, breakdown, or disabling but noleathal damage in the field. Of course, this wasn't very likely. Anything that could take out a Jeffy was likely to be able to handle the driver too.
The corporal shoved the kit into his arms and moved on without speaking. 187295 looked over the package in his arms. It had a standard insulating cold-weather survival blanket, assorted string, rope, and suchlike. A small selection of firestarters was enclosed in a environment-tight bag. And the final element, and in 187295's mind the most potentially useful, was a standard Arm combat rifle. It was a combination of a laser rifle, laser knife, and a small nanolathe. 187295 called up the 'lathe's blueprint files. With a sigh, he noticed that they were very limited. A basic array of survival gear only was included, and the gun's supply of metal was very small. Of course it had a energy generator built in and quite a bit of power stored, but that was required for laser fire.
187295 paused to think. The gun's 'lathe had a reclaim function as well. So he could use that to increase its supply of metal and energy. Not by much, but perhaps by enough to make a difference. He'd have to work out very carefully what to use the metal and energy for.
The thrusters fired up again and 187295 barely managed to keep from falling over as the Hercules began to decelerate. The corporal called out the number of the clone to drop at this stop. The clone stepped over to the door and was dropped down to the ground by an anti-grav field. Then the thrusters fired up again, and the transport was off to its next destination.
"187295! Come on, wake up! We'll be at your drop in a few minutes. And if you don't make it, you'll be reassigned!" The corporal's voice rang through a very interesting dream 187295 was having. He resignedly shook himself awake and stood up.
The Hercules was already decelerating towards its destination. It looked like his would be among the last drops made by this trandport. He shook his head, gathered his gear, and walked over to the door.
The Hercules stopped with a jolt, almost shaking him off his feet. Then the anti-grav field caught him. He suddenly felt as if he could float, could fly up into the sky and away from the training camp. The pack and rifle suddenly felt like they weighted nothing at all. The door in front of him opened, and he stepped out into thin air.
He slowly floated down towards the ground. Overhead, the bulk of the Hercules transport hovered on jets of flame. It was unarmed and lightly armoured, and was a favoured target of Core fighter pilots during combat. They saw it as a quick kill. But from 187295's point of view, it was amazing. The shape was like a slightly bulkier version of the Atlas heavy transport, which was used for transporting combat cars or tanks, or even PeeWee Kbots.
Then his feet hit the ground, and the antigravity field cut off. He almost fell from the sudden weight of the survival pack, rifle, and his own body. The Hercules' thrusters fired up with a roar, and it moved away over the trees. 187295 survayed the area they'd dropped him into.
It seemed to be in the middle of a large forest. Trees were all around. Thick enough to block out the view of the sky in some places, but not close to thick enough to impeed his movement. The ground was mostly flat, and was covered with a thin layer of leaves and damp. It wouldn't be bad to walk on, but he might catch cold if he sat on it for too long.
A holographic projector buried somewhere in the rifle activated, and an image of Denson appeared.
"By now, you've arrived at your target area. You will have to survive out here for one standard week. One standard week from now, a Hercules will return to the drop-off point to pick you up. That is, if your life beacon is still active. It is your responsibility to be at the pick-up point. Oh, and good luck. Denson out."
187295 sighed and looked around. There was no water nearby, and his rifle's 'lathe wasn't set up to nanolathe water. He'd have to find some. He couldn't go a week without water. A thought struck him and he looked up at the sky. It was definatly very cloudy. Somewhere in his head, the knowledge that clouds ment rain unfolded, and he got an idea. But first, he had to be sure.
Switching on his rifle's nanolathe, he flipped through the blueprints until he found a simple weather analysis system. An obsolete model, that had been phased out on most worlds almost a hundred years ago, but useful all the same. This version had a limited life of about an hour, but wouldn't take up too much of his resources. He activated the 'lathe.
A green skeleton sprang into existence, supported by the 'lathe's fields. A green stream of nanobots sprayed from the lathe, playing over the frame. Within minutes, 187295 had a primitive weather-analysis system. He caught it just as the 'lathe fields released it, and made a mental note not to nanolathe objects in mid-air anymore. A flick of a switch activated the computer, which confirmed that it was going to rain. Probably within the next couple of hours.
He quickly reclaimed the computer, returning most of the resources that had gone into making it to the rifle's storage and settled down to think. A quick flip through the lathe blueprints revealed what 187295 thought to be possibly the most useful item on-file. A canteen with a water-collection field. Rain over an area about a meter square would be funneled into the canteen and purified by the field. But then he saw the cost of it. It would take most of his resources to create! But he had to drink. He set the rifle on the ground and activated the 'lathe. As it worked away on the water collector, he turned away, to set up his shelter.
This was were his biosuit came in handy. Its strength-enhancing properties allowed him to break branches off trees without the aid of an ax or hatchet. By the time the canteen was done, he'd managed to break off enough wood to errect a decent shelter and start a small fire.
Rain pounded down on all sides, drenching the forest. 187295 was glad that he'd had the sense to build his shelter on fairly high ground. A lot of the lower ground was flooded. Even up here, the ground wasn't exactly dry. His canteen had been filled in the first five minutes of the downpour, so he now had enough water to last him about a week. The problem now was that he was soaked and tired. The rainstorm had been going on for three days now.
Thunder rolled. 187295 briefly cowered, expecting Core attack jets to blow him, or something nearby, away any second. Then something unravelled in his mind. That was thunder. Caused by a mostly harmless electrical discharge. Nothing to be afraid of. He paused for a moment. How had he know that? How had he known either of those facts?
He settled in and thought. Now that he knew it was there, he could practically feel buried memories, instincts, and skills. But there was something that was cutting them off from him. Something that was keeping them away from him.
He was broken out of these thoughts by the sound of branches breaking. One hand reached out for and found his rifle. Someone, or something, was coming. Although what would be out on a night like this, he couldn't imagine. Something big, though, judging from the noise it was making.
Then he saw it. A dark shape, moving slowly uphill. It seemed to be sniffing the air, as if it were looking for something. Its head turned towards him, and 187295 tried to burrow into the leaves. Its eyes were glowing, a strange green colour. But they were definatly organic. That was a bit of a releif, since it ment that the thing wasn't some strange Core machine.
Whatever it was, it was worse. It bounded up the hill, moving almost as fast as a Kbot. Now 187295 could see the muscles on its arms and legs. The thing didn't have claws, but it looked like it didn't need them. Almost without thinking about it, he levelled his laser rifle and fired. The thing slumped to the ground, quite dead. 187295 curled up to try and sleep.
Three days later, the rain stopped. The day afterwards, the Hercules transport had arrived to pick him up. It arrived with the roar of thruster fire, and sent leaves swirlling as it hovered overhead. Its crew quickly located 187295 and anti-graved him aboard.
The door closed behind him with a resolute clang, and 187295 barely remained upright as the Hercules accelerated away towards its next pick-up point. Gradually, the accleration lessened, until 187295 was able to stand by himself and walk over to some webbing. He sat down with a sigh. For the first time in a week, he was back in civilised surroundings.
"Hello," a voice startled him. "Didn't expect to see you here. Weren't we on different transports going out?"
It took 187295 a couple of seconds to recognize the voice, then he smiled, "165937!"
165937 laughed, "Looks like they only needed two transports to bring the survivors back in. Or perhaps even only one."
187295 was shocked. The Arm would never do that!
"Perhaps there's another explanation," he said. "Maybe the transports fly different routes. Or something like that. The Arm wouldn't just let a third of a cadre die, of exposure, or thirst, or... whatever!"
165937 laughed, "Perhaps. But I don't think we're that nice. This is war, you know. Better to let them go out in the wilderness with a minimum field kit than on the battlefield, where they'd take an expensive combat car or tank and perhaps an entire plan with 'em!" Seeing 187295's distraught expression, he slapped him on the back. "Cheer up! You might be right."
187295 looked towards his friend, "I encountered this weird, black thing out there..."
165937 laughed again. "Selastan Strangler. One of the Arm's greatest achievements in genetic engineering." He grinned again, "While you and 175896 have been partying, I've been doing my homework. The Arm originally engineered those to take out groups of Core infantry. When they proved a bit too vulnerable to A-Ks, the project was cancelled. Looks like they've found another use for them."
187295 was shocked. He couldn't believe this. The Arm, the cause of good and justice throughout the galaxy, had put something out there to try and kill him. They couldn't have done that! He was a human being! It never occured to him that he was a clone, and was expendible in the eyes of Arm command. All of whom were, incidentally, natural-born.
[Top]
187295 evaded wildly. Laser fire was coming at him from all directions. He didn't know what had happened to the rest of his squad, but he assumed they'd been destroyed. He'd only survived because he'd been on point and the enemy had waited until he was past to open fire.
Twisting his turret around, he returned fire. One of his shots hit an enemy combat car, and it flipped over, rolling down a dune. He gasped in amazement at what he saw behind the former combat car. The enemy had a light tank, and it was coming after him. He accelerated more, pushing his engine to its limits. Gradually, the light tank began to fall behind.
An explosion sounded, and it took him a couple of seconds to realize that it was his car that had been hit. The tires sprayed sand as they locked up. Mercifully, his car didn't flip, but it was still close. He looked around and saw a Jeffy moving in front of him. He'd been so focused on the Flash that he didn't notice it.
With a suddeness that surprised him, his systems came back to life. His com activated, and Denson's voice spoke into his mind.
"Good exercise. Notice that the blue team won because you were concentrating too much on the tanks. In a situation like that, if there isn't much difference between the light and heavy units, take out the lights first. Cut down on the volume of incoming fire. The only time you don't do that is if you encounter a Raider. In that case, take out the Raider! Now, lets try this again. All people, back to your starting zones."
187295 turned his car and drove back towards his green team's lines at a leasurely pace. He wasn't in a particular hurry to start the next exercise. And he was thinking, trying to figure out a way for a squad of combat cars to quickly take down a Flash. That they had to keep moving was obvious, but the Flash would still eventually work out their patterns and blow them away...
Denson's voice came into his mind again, "170624, where are you going? You are leaving the training zone. 170624, respond! You are leaving the training zone," Denson's voice faded out for a moment, then came back at the end of a stream of curses, "...pattern-*distortion* son-of-a-mother... Alright, all units, we've got a rogue! 170624, for whatever reason, has switched his car off combat mode and disconnected from base. He's headed into unscanned territory. We don't have so much as a skimmer out there.
"I'm authorizing your weapons and vehicles to switch into combat mode A. You can shoot anything base IDs as a hostile, but your guns won't fire at anything else. 170624's entered a forest, so he'll be going much slower than you will. Catch and retrieve or destroy 170624. I'll be with you."
187295 swallowed. One of the clones from their training cadre had gone renegade. And they were being ordered to hunt down and kill a former comrade. Someone they could have been friends with at one point. But still, they had to do this. Or they might be... reassigned. 187295 activated his nav map, turned his car onto the heading 170624 was last reported taking, and throttled up to maximum.
Half an hour later, then entire cadre had reached the forest that 170624 had vanished into. It wasn't a regular forest, but a rock forest. Tall formations of a strange living rock glittered beautifully in the sunlight. But they also played games with long-range sensors, so the cadre had to manually sweep through the forest, using short-range and visual sensors to locate their target.
Denson's voice floated into 187295's head with what seemed like the millionth update, "No sign of the target as of yet. But the flyboys back at base have just allocated a squadron of Peepers for our use. They'll sweep ahead of us and try to turn up something. Keep an eye out, though. We still don't know what's in here."
187295 twisted his car through a formation of rocks. Sensor traces his computer tagged as false leads flickered over his display. As his scanners made two more sweeps of the area, he began to relax. There was nothing here.
The side of a rock tree behind him vaporized as a laser blast hit it, sending molten globs of rock flying in all directions. The blast had come from the sensor trace of a Jeffy that his computer had tagged as false due to its position near some metal ore. 187295 ran his engine up to maximum power, wildly skidding through some evasive manouvers.
"187295 to 374th training cadre. I've got our target! All squad members, converge on my present position. Everyone else, try and cut off escape routes!" A second later, he realized that he'd just tried to give orders to a unit that wasn't his, including his commanding officer. He might be reassigned for this...
Denson's voice made him relax a bit, "Do as the clone says! He's talking sense. Just because orders don't come from me doesn't mean you refuse them out of hand."
187295 fired a volley of laser blasts towards his enemy. All his shots missed his now-evading opponent, sending half-melted bits of stone flying everywhere. Some of these did strike his opponent, and his computer reported a 35% reduction in the effectiveness of his target's heavy armour.
Three more Jeffys joined the battle, bouncing over rocks and rubble as they sped towards the enemy, lasers stabbing out. None hit, but his computers informed him of a further 15% degredation in his target's armour. The sound of rocks crunching and tread motors running at full power made him look around. Denson's Flash was crawling into the clearing, EMGs twisting towards the target.
As EMG rounds began flying, getting closer and closer to it all the time, their target seemed to admit that he had no chance. With a twist none of them thought a living human could pull off without being smeared into the seat, it twisted 180 degrees and sped off. It weaved among the columns of stone, vanishing from their sensors before any of them could pursue.
Denson's stream of curses made 187295 wince. Even with overwhelming numbers, their target had still gotten away. Suddenly the stream of curses stopped and Denson asked a question. 187295 didn't quite catch it, since he'd been trying to tune out Denson's cursing.
"Could you please repeat, sir?" he asked.
"187295, did you manage to get a detailed sensor scan of your target?"
187295 queired his computer on this.
//Affermative. Detailed sensor scan was made upon initial contact with the enemy as per Arm SOP. Forwarding data to: Flash-01-Sergeant_Denson now.\\
Denson was quiet for a moment, then the stream of curses started up again. Denson opened a channel to Arm command, which in turn relayed it to all units under Denson's command.
"We've got a problem. Sensor data from the units that engaged the renegade confirmed my suspicions. The clone was replaced by a pattern in a biomechanical Avatar-class Core Kbot. The time when this happened is unknown, but judging from the unit's age, it was done while the clone was at base. I recommend checking for any excessive reclamation and lathing. We've got an infiltrator somewhere. Also, have all available Peeper scout aircraft sweep heading 256."
"Acknowledged, Flash-01-Sergeant_Denson. We already reached the same conclusion, and did a sweep. The infiltrator was Sterr."
187295 could hardly believe it. One of the founders of the Arm was a Core infiltrator?
"Yes," the base continued, "Sterr was an infiltrator. Judging from his body's age, he has been for some time. At least since he took the job bartending here, and perhaps even before he founded the Arm."
Denson seemed too shocked even to curse. 187295 slammed on his breaks, and tried to get his mind around this new, frightening idea.
[Top]
Arm Peeper Operator 39 flew his squadron of six aircraft over the rock forest. His sensors probed down into the giant spires of rock, searching for a little piece of metal among so much. It would have been impossible if he didn't know exactly what he was looking for, and if his target didn't have quite a large thermal and radiation signature.
APO-39 wasn't in any of the Peepers himself. The Arm had found that nanolathing clones for each Peeper, which didn't tend to last too long under ground-to-air or air-to-air fire of any volume, was much too expensive. So they'd worked out a system where one clone could control a squadron of Peepers from a Neural Control Tank. The tanks were usually located somewhere safe, like a base or bunker, but mobile versions had also been developed. Peepers were barely heavy enough to carry a clone anyways. They could barely carry thrusters, sensors, and convetional armour.
He grinned as a Peeper he had on a wide sweep picked up his quarry. The Jeffy was making a break for it, running out across the open rock desert to the west. He gathered his squadron and swooped after it. The pilot began making evasive manouvers, trying desperatly to loose him. But APO-39 kept his aircraft well spread out, so as soon as the Jeffy escaped from one another picked it up.
APO-39 kept up the chase for several minutes. Then something caught his eye. There was the gleam of metal ahead, and the flame of something launching. He through his Peepers into wild evasives, trying to keep an eye on the Jeffy while making sure that his craft survived.
The Jeffy sped on, and APO-39 kept his squadron following it, all the while evading in case something was launched at him. Out of the corner of his sensors, he thought he saw something moving against a cloud. But when he looked again, there was nothing there. He shrugged, and returned his attention to the ground. What he saw almost made him loose control of his entire squadron.
Spreading out on the ground was what looked like a huge Core army camp. Infantry bots, combat cars, and tanks were everywhere, seemingly loosely organized into squads and mostly shut down. They seemed to be beginning to power up and organize. And there were domes of strange communications and computing gear that the units seemed to be clustered around.
APO-39 recovered quickly from his shock and began sweeping his Peeper's sensors and scanners over the base, gathering and recording all the data he could. In the center of the base, there was what looked like a large nanofactory. And there was at least a battalion of the Armoured Killers, or AKs, here. Mostly supporting the infantry, but there were what looked like some AK-only units.
A flak shell exploded on the hull of one of his Peepers, reducing it to fragments spiralling groundwards. Couldn't forget the flak guns, could he? Oh, no. He found and tagged all the flak guns and missile launchers he could find, both mobile and stationary. The few laser turrets and Bombadier plasma turrets he could find got the same treatment. Another Peeper died, this time from a missile that sprang up from a launcher.
One more thing to do before he left. APO-39 turned his craft towards the center of the base and activated every afterburner and booster system he had. As he passed over the center of the Core base, he gasped. There was what looked like a galactic gate there. No, it was a galactic gate ship!
The galactic gate ships had been used mostly during the years of colonization following the development of nanolathes. They were little more than a heat sheild, interstellar drive, thruster package, and rudimentry guiding AI. Instead of having a voyage of as much as a year to their new home, either in coldsleep or awake, the colonists could live in their old home and continue their lives. In the meantime, the ship would travel to their new world. Upon landing, most of the ship would be reclaimed to give the colony a starting store of metal and energy. Then the gate would send a signal, indicating it was ready. The colonists would then transit to their new home in small lots.
At the beginning of the war, gateships had fallen into disuse. Most inhabited planets had their own gates or the methods to build them. Interstellar drive had evolved to the point where most voyages were over in weeks. And a galactic gate was not high on a new colony's list of priorities. It seemed that the Core had found another use for such ships. As invasion landing craft, so an entire invasion force wouldn't attract much attention.
As he raced his squadron away from the base, he didn't even notice the squadron of Avenger fighters that dropped down behind him until the lock warnings chimed. And by then it was too late. High explosives tore through his Peeper squadron, leaving only bits and pieces to fall to earth. When the Arm techs opened the interface pod, APO-39 was alive but injured. He was bleeding in several places from the mental shock of having a squadron of aircraft shot out from under him.
Less than half an hour later, the entire personel compliment of the training camp was sitting in a huge lecture room. Every seat had been filled by all levels of personel. Training Sergeants were seated with their cadres. Even the cloned personel and the natural born officers weren't segregated. Normally, they avoided each other. The clones found natural birth slightly nausiating, and the natural borns felt the same way about cloning. But both were needed to fight this War, so they tolerated each other.
The holotank at the front of the room lit up, showing what looked like an old man. From the complexity of the structure in the background and the people running around, 187295 assumed that it was a feed from one of the main Arm worlds. Perhaps even Empyrrean itself!
"Good... evening," the man spoke. Somehow, his voice seemed to convey years of experience. Something about the voice and face was familiar to 187295, but he couldn't tell what. "I am Commander Hrine, in charge of Arm operations in this sector. Recently, as you know, I recieved a transmission that a Core base has been discovered on your world of Camp-5. And that Sterr, one of the most trusted Arm personel ever to live, was in fact not alive at all, but a Core infiltrator! Since we assumed that the location of our Camp worlds were closely guarded secrets, this has come as a great shock to us. A program is currently underway to establish watch stations and garrisons on the other Camp worlds, to protect against a similar invasion. But this still leaves us with a Core base on your world."
The man paused, reading a display that none in the auditorium could see. The camera zoomed out slightly to show his body. At first, 187295 thought the man was some kind of cyborg. But then he realized that the man was wearing a battlesuit of some kind. This time, his mind supplied the answer almost immediatly, even though he could never have known it. It was one of the newly built Commander suits. Equipped with the biggest nanolathes ever mounted on a mobile unit, a pair of heavy red lasers, an experimental cloaking device and radar, amphibious capabilities, and a matter-antimatter backpack that could store enough energy and metal to power and expand a large pre-War city for several decades, it was the weapon that could change the course of the war.
Commander Hrine continued his briefing, "Since we have no forces on your world, you have no Gate, and our nearest battlefleet is over a week's travel away, you're going to have to deal with this yourselves. Consider a final exam of sorts," Commander Hrine grinned and continued. "We have provided your officers and Lathebots with improved blueprints, including technology the Core probably isn't expecting you to have. Our newest model PeeWee suits, Jeffy-Cs, Blaze heavy combat tanks, and a new surprise. Since the Core seems to have air superiority you couldn't hope to match, we've given you the blueprints for our newest Kbot prototype. The Jethro guided missile launcher. Its not nearly as powerful against ground forces as our other prototype Kbots, but it should keep those Avengers off your backs."
The screen flickered. 187295 was afraid the transmission site or reciever had been damaged, or that the Core was jamming it (which was impossible. No one could jam interstellar communications). Then the image came back.
"Since I'm not there, I can't tell you what tactics to use, where to attack, or anything like that. I'm trusting your officers to do well in that respect. As I said earlier, consider this a final exam. If you pass, you not only survive but get decorated and assigned to combat units. And if you fail, there is no second try. Commander Hrine out."
187295 blinked for a second, then turned towards 175896. She'd chosen to sit with him earlier, instead of with her officer cadre. She seemed happy and joyful, even with a Core invasion and combat pending. But now she looked shocked. 187295 reached out a hand and shook her by the shoulder.
"175896? What is it?" he asked, genuinely worried.
175896 swallowed and turned towards him, "By Arm regulations, the identity or career of a genetic donor are never revealed to anyone. The names aren't even on file. All genetic patterns are stored as codes, designating vehicle drivers, infantry, naval pilots, aircraft pilots, gunners, or whatever. But 187295..."
She trailed off and 187295 waited patiently for her to continue. She swallowed again, "Without the age lines, your face looks exactly like Commander Hrine's!"
187295 blinked, unable to say anything. His genetic donor was an Arm Commander. And a very high-ranking one at that! He sat back in his chair and clutched his head as memories began to unfold inside it. He bit his lip, trying not to scream in pain.
[Top]
187295 shook himself awake as the comline crackled back into static again. He checked his vehicle's heading, found that it was going where it should be, and contacted his squad leader.
"Please repeat, 175896."
She sighed, "187295, keep your eyes and ears open. We've recieved new orders. A spysat managed to get a shot of our defector with a group of Core units just behind the front lines. The group isn't that big, so we're going to try to slip through the lines under the cover of Jammers. We've been assigned to destroy the defector and any units with him. 175896 out."
187295 nodded and looked for the Jammer car. There it was, right in the middle of formation. It was another Jeffy variant, this time equipped with only a huge radar jamming array. It was almost garunteed to hide them from any Core radar pointed their way. And, unlike infantry-based jammers, it could keep pace with the combat cars.
Checking his display, he saw that they were moving along their standard patrol route, just behind the lines where Arm and Core tanks, Kbots, and infantry pointed weapons at each other and waited for the order to fire. Then, new orders flashed onto his screen. With a swift move that almost surprised even him, he twisted the car through a 90-degree turn and headed for a deep ravine. The rest of his formation made the same turn. The Jammer activated, lighting up and beginning to spin, working hard to jam any Core radar pointed their way.
The squad clustered tighter together. At first, 187295 though they were never going to fit into the ravine. But they did, just barely. The walls scraped against the cars at the edge of the formation, but they fit. Traversing his turret back and forth, 187295 watched for any Core units that could give his group's position away. There!
On a rise just ahead, he spotted the silouhette of a missile turret. It hadn't seen them yet, but it doubtless would soon. He contacted 175869.
"We've got a problem, 175869. Missile turret, just over that rise," She nodded. "Hasn't seen us yet, right? Alright. Lets see how it like some plasma fire from our orbiting batteries."
187295's orders changed suddenly and he slammed on the breaks. The entire squad did the same, coming to a complete halt inside of two seconds. He settled back in his seat and looked up, admiring the cloudless blue sky overhead. A flash somewhere up there made him sit up straight.
"175869! I think an aircraft has spotted us!"
She chuckled, "The Core weren't very well prepared, 187295. They forgot that we've got a couple of latheships up in space. As soon as we found the base, they started nanolathing a couple of orbital plasma batteries. And the first shell should be arriving about... now..."
And it was. 187295 saw a orange sphere streaking towards the ground, but only because he knew to look. It fell from as high up as he could see down to ground level in just over a second. And it hit within three meters of the Core missile turret.
The resulting explosion sent bits of the missile turret flying everywhere. Secondary explosions blossomed as the turret's ammo cooked off, sending unarmed missiles pinwheeling everywhere. 187295 grinned and gunned his engine as the order came to move out. Plasma rained down all along the Core lines. Not all of it was as acurate as the round that destroyed the missile turret, but it was enough to even the odds a bit. Now the Arm were only outnumbered three to one.
187295 bounced over a couple of small dunes. His entire squadron was moving at top speed. They were behind Core lines now, and they had to find and destroy the deserter before they were found by Core patrols or their jammer failed. And once the Core radar had a lock, the Jammer would have to go down for recalibration, which could take anywhere from a few minutes to an hour.
They were close now to the projected position of the deserter. From orbital recon footage, they knew the deserter was somewhere in this area. But since the plasma bombardment had started, the Core had built a couple of ground-to-space laser batteries and started demolishing the Arm's orbital advantage. So they didn't know exaclty where the defector was.
187295 was almost relaxed when the missile lock warnings began to chime.
Core infantrybots carrying rocket launchers burst out of the dunes around them. Missiles fired into the Arm formation. Although the conventional rockets carried by most of the infantrybots couldn't do much to the heavy armour, some of the infantry were carrying antimatter or plasma charges.
Brilliant explosions and flying bits of metal marked the death of two combat cars as their heavy armour generators failed catastrophically.
"All units! Get those missile bots!" 175869's orders rang out so loud that even a dead man would hear them, "Start with the ones I've marked." Several of the infantrybots glowed bright red.
187295 twisted his turret around and put a laser through one of the bots. He located the next one and traversed his turret towards it, shooting anything that his computer tagged as Core that was in his targeting display. Another one of the marked infantrybots fell to his laser. Then they were all gone and the dunes were empty. He looked around. There had to be something more to this...
The dunes exploded again. A small squadron of eight Weasel combat cars erupted from where they'd been buried. With them were two Instigators and a Jeffy! 187295 opened the fuel injector all the way, accelerating his combat car to its maximum speed inside of a couple of seconds. Laser fire fused the sand behind him into glass.
He twisted his car through a series of evasive manouvers, exchanging laser fire with one of the Weasels. Whoever that pattern was, it was good. It managed to hit him a couple of times before he shot its turret off and destroyed several of its tires. The enemy car settled into the sand, immobilized.
Then the Jeffy was firing at him. He almost automatically noted that several of his squadmates were taking on the Intstiagtors. They seemed to be doing quite well there. All but two of the Weasels had died, and the rest of his squadmates were taking on them. He was the only one paying any attention to the tratorous Jeffy. He grinned. That patternspawned son-of-a-microchip wouldn't get away this time!
He spent a moment tracking the traitor with his turret, making sure the first shot would hit. And it did, melting some of the traitor's armour. The traitor noticed him then, putting his, no its, vehicle into an evasive spin and wildly returning fire with its laser. 187295 grinned. This was one kill he'd enjoy.
His next volley of fire missed his target, fusing more sand into half-melted glass. But his opponent hit, and 187295 winced as he felt the burn of the laser on his heavy armour. His generators whined in protest, but began to shore up the damage. He sped out across the dunes, then looped around towards the traitor again.
The traitor twisted his car at the last second, and all but one of 187295's laser blasts missed, sailing off across the dunes. The traitor turned and began to speed away, its wheels kicking up sand. 187295 grinned.
"Not this time," he thought. His wheels spun, kicking up sand, then he sped after the traitor. They sped across the dunes, exchanging volleys of lasers. It took 187295 almost a full minute to realise he'd left the jammer field. "Oh..."
He didn't manage to finish the curse. Four Avenger fighters dived down, and his missile lock warning screamed at him. Antimatter-tipped missiles screamed down from the sky and exploded, sending huge columns of sand blasting up into the air. More missile volleys rained down as the Avengers dived.
Then the Core fighters pulled up and sped away into the sky, their drives glowing yellowish-orange against the blue sky. But 187295 didn't even notice this. The only thing he noticed was the grey, blasted, pockmarked remains of the traitor's Jeffy. It seemed that the Core fighters hadn't been too picky about which Jeffy their missiles hit. Perhaps the traitor wasn't so important to them after all. He wheeled his car around and sped back into the Jammer field. According to the sensor readings of his squadmates, there was still an Instigator to deal with. The battle went on.
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The Arm and the Core had been at a standoff for two days now. The Core had the advantage of numbers, as they almost always did. But the Arm still had one orbital plasma cannon and entrenched defensive positions. The Core had already tried an assault, and failed miserably.
187295 sat in his combat car and drummed his fingers on the dashboard. Ever since that skirmish yesterday, the Core had been working on tightening their defences and upgrading their fire control. There had been a few battles at various points along the line, but nothing major. And the waiting was wearing on his nerves.
He was also quite shocked. Arm units had recovered the remains of the Weasel he'd disabled, and the pattern circuits were still active. Once its loyalty subsystems had been removed, the pattern had expressed an interest in being transferred to a cloned body and becoming a Jeffy driver for the Arm. After a through psychological evaluation to determine that she was sincere, the pattern was transferred to a body cloned from DNA data stored in the pattern itself.
When he finally met the person he'd captured, 187295 couldn't have been more surprised. It was one of his sisters, who he thought had been killed during a Core raid just before he joined the Arm. Both his sisters and his mother had been patterned, not killed like he thought.
With the relevation that some patterns might want to return to a life in an organic body, the Arm Command for Camp-05 changed its standing orders. Instead of destroying it on sight, Regional Central Consiousness hardware was to be captured. All paterns stored there who wanted to be transferred to organic bodies would be, and then the hardware would be destroyed.
Off to his left, 187295 noticed flashes of laser fire. He could see an infantry squad skirmishing with a Core A-K. A squadron of enemy bombers sped by overhead, headed deeper behind Arm lines. His radio crackled to life just as one of the bombers broke up under heavy AA fire.
"This is Arm Command to all units. Over the past five minutes, Core activity has increased almost 400%. We believe that they've finally decided to risk defeat and attack. Manouvering orders will be coming down from your Commanding Officers."
And surely enough, orders did arrive. 187295's squad was in a quiet area of the front. So their job was to make sure it didn't stay quiet for long. Supported by a couple of infantry divisions and a platoon of Kbots, they were to try and penetrate the Core lines. Their orders told them to destroy and Core attack forces or patrols they came across and try to reach the Core base. Once there, they were to attack and provide targeting data for the orbital plasma cannon. 187285 grinned and activated his engine. Time for some action!
His squad had been expanded quite a bit since their last operation. They now had ten Flash tanks, four Blaze tanks (Blazes were Flashes with slightly beefed up armour and a plasma cannon, but no EMGs) and almost twice as many Jeffies. His sister was in one of them. He could see the infantry divisions coming down the trenches on either side to join them, and the towering shapes of the PeeWees, just under twice the size of a man, coming up from behind.
With a spray of sand, the attack force moved out. The combat cars easily lept the infantry trenches and the tanks just rolled over them. The infantry's exoskeletons allowed them to easily keep up with the combat cars.
The ground shook as the first of the PeeWees lept the trench. The others followed, creating more minor seismic shocks. If the Core didn't know they were coming before, they sure did now. 187295 checked to make sure his heavy armour and laser were at full power. They were.
Bright flashes of laser fire lept towards them from the Core trench as they raced towards it. The Core infantrybots carried heavier lasers than the Arm infantry, but they still had a hard time with combat cars. And even though they were at extreme range for infantry weapons, 187295's lasers would have no trouble hitting at this range.
He shot three infantrybots in quick succession, their explosions sending fragments flying everywhere. Infantrybots were far too small to carry heavy armour generators, so they only had conventional armour for protection. Too bad for them.
A missile exploded against his car's hood. Some of the infantrybots had rocket launchers. 187295 cursed himself for not looking for and eliminating those ones first. He did so now, picking off three of them as he closed with the trench. His comrades were doing the same, and the Core infantrybots were taking heavy losses.
The last of the Core infantrybots fell to plasma fire from the Blazes and 187295 sped up. His computer was protesting that he'd exceeded the maximum safe operating speed of the engine, but he ignored it. His car hit the edge of the trench and lept over it, tyres spinning as he hit the ground on the other side. Then they caught and he was off again, speeding across the ground behind Core lines. The rest of his squad followed, the various vehicles getting over this trench the same way they had before.
In the rock forest, they ran into a squadron of Core tanks that they easily defeated. The battle claimed one of their Flashes and almost a full platoon of infantrymen, but none of the Core tanks survived. In other sectors, the battle was not doing well for the Arm. Their aircraft had almost all been shot down by the numerically superior Core fighters. The infantry lines were holding, but barely. Only two squads had managed to penetrate Core lines, but one was held down in a firefight with a squadron of A-Ks and some weird Kbot that attacked its targets with ice.
The Arm latheships had managed to construct a particle cannon in orbit, but like the plasma cannon, it needed targeting data. So it fell on 187295's squad to get close enough to the Core base to relay that data to the orbiting weapons. And then they had to help the weapons destroy it. He could have laughed if he wasn't so scared. The entire Arm plan on this planet depended on what had been, a week before, five training cadres.
The terrain as they sped towards the Core base was strangely bare of units and defences. They only found a couple of missile towers, which their Blaze tanks easily destroyed. As they got closer to the base, though, the defences got heavier and heavier. They encountered groups of missile towers, laser cannon, and plasma turrets. By the time they were close enough to see the Core base, they'd lost half their infantry and a third of their Jeffys. Luckily, they hadn't lost any more tanks.
The base was mostly unchanged since the Peeper recon two days ago. A few more defensive structures had been thrown up, but most of the base was the same. There wasn't even any sign of the minor pounding that had happened from orbit. The only major change was the trio of ground-to-space laser cannon that sat around the Galactic Gate. They were quiet now, but 187295 was sure they were just waiting for the orbiting weapons batteries to betray their positions.
The Blazes announced the Arm's arrival by levelling several perimeter defences with their plasma cannon. Instantly, hostile fire started coming their way.
187295 sped towards the base, weaving as he went to try and avoid some of the hostile fire. He succeeded in taking only a single hit, from a laser cannon that he didn't notice until it was far too late. But that blow reduced his armour effectiveness to 60%. By the time Core units began activating and organizing against the threat, the Arm were among their buildings. Many infantrybots died in brilliant explosions as the Jeffies raced among them, and many Weasels were disabled or destroyed before they could realize what was going on.
And still the Core outnumbered them by at least ten times. Two Jeffies and a Flash died under plasma fire, but not before they transmitted targeting data on the ground-to-space laser cannon. A blue beam speared through the center of one of the lasers, vaporizing it on impact. The other two began to return fire, but one of them died as a plasma shell incinerated it. The final laser was destroyed by his squad's Flash tanks.
187295 shot another missile turret, hitting its missile storage. The ammunition exploded, wiping out the top of the turret. He hit its remains and his car lept into the air. As he landed, he shot an infantrybot in the head. They were doing a lot of damage, but the outcome was still in question.
With a blast of light so intense that his computer disabled that part of his view field, the Core Galactic Gate imploded. Its containment fields failed, and for a brief second, the singularity that powered it went out of control. Several of the buildings around it were partially sucked into the resulting black hole before it deteriorated into mere dense matter, leaving the buildings twisted into an interesting shape. Anything too close to the singularity was sucked inwards, and many units from both sides were entwined with the damage buildings far too tightly to escape without assistance.
Evading fire from several sources, 187295 exchanged fire with a Weasel. This one, too, he disabled. He noted that he seemed to be having a fairly good rate of disabling Core units, and wondered if this was another family member? Then it was out of sight, and he stored the thought in his computer, for later consideration.
A nanofactory loomed ahead. His laser cut through its armour and sparks flew from the factory. Sheets of armour slid off, disintigrating as they left the heavy armour field. After what seemed like an enternity, the factory exploded and 187295 paused to sweep his sensors over the enemy base. What he saw amazed him. There were few Core units left active, and most of those had surrendered the instant the Tactical Control Computer was destroyed. Fires raged throughout the base, but the domes housing the Regional Central Consciousness were untouched. Their destruction would come later.
He paused again to consider the wonder of this. A group of underequipped trainees had destroyed an entire Core base. Although they did have the help of orbital weapons batteries, the thought gave 187295 hope. Perhaps this War would be over before YearsEnd, like the news releases always said it would. His joy died a bit as the causualty reports flowed in. His unit had taken over 75% casualties. His sister and 175869 had survived, but 165937 had died while trying to evade fire from two Instigators and get a targeting lock for the orbital guns. Perhaps victory wasn't so sweet after all.
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187295 stood at the base of the entry ramp leading into Arm Space Transport 0567891. The huge bulk of the Space Transport, towering over almost every other structure on the launch pad, easily blocked out the sun. Here in its shadow, things would have been completely dark if not for the light provided by the warming launch engines.
His mother and two sisters had come to see him off. Since they'd been "rescued" from the Core Pattern Databases and installed into cloned bodies, he'd seen them almost every day. They'd gone through a lot at the hands of the Core, and hardly seemed like the people he barely remembered knowing.
In fact, he hadn't known them. Not really. He could remember knowing them, but that had happened to his donor. He'd never seen them before, no matter what his memory said. He was well aware that they thought of him as a clone, not really the Hrine they knew. It didn't matter that his DNA was exactly the same, that his retinal pattern matched exactly, or that his brainwaves were the same down to the level where memory started affecting them. He wasn't the Hrine they'd known.
But even though they didn't think of him as Hrine, they still thought of him as a member of their family. So while they were waiting for the transport that would take them to Empyrrean to be re-united with Commander Hrine, they had kindly come to see him off.
He almost laughed. They didn't realize that Commander Hrine would probably see them as clones, replicas taken from a Core Database of people that in his mind had died a long time ago. Impossibly young people from his distant past. This war could become harder on the living than the dead. At least the dead didn't have to take it any more.
Finally, their goodbyes were done. 187295 knew they probably wouldn't take combat postings. They'd want to help in some way, but wouldn't want to fight. Commander Hrine would probably assign them to clerk jobs within the army, or nanolathe units of some kind. 187295 watched them wander off across the landing field, then turned and walked into the Space Transport. His hand breifly came up to touch the Silver Arm he'd been awarded by the assembled Arm officers of Camp-05.
He'd also been given Veteran status, since he'd killed fifty Core units by direct fire, and promoted to corporal. The officers were apparently very pleased with him, since he'd been transferred to Gamma Platoon of the 572nd Arm Cavalry Combat Division, on the world of Heaven's Cloud. One of the most famous combat units in the entire Arm resistance. His mind wandered back to the reception after the presentations the night before...
He'd been pushing his way through the crowd for ages, looking for his one friend who was still alive. Normally it wouldn't have taken as long as it did, but people kept stopping him to congradulate him and offer him drinks. It invariably took him a minute to hear them out and decline, then push on through the crowd.
Finally, he caught sight of her. Just as he was stepping towards her, Sergeant Denson stepped out of the crowd, holding a drink of something that 187295 didn't even begin to recognize. He did catch a wiff of it, and was surprised there weren't visible fumes coming out of it. It smelled so alcoholic it could probably be used to kill the most virulent and toughest plagues ever encountered. And that was only a thimble-sized cup of the stuff.
Denson grinned, "Congradulations, kid!"
187295 nodded, "Thank you, sir."
"Don't bother with that sir stuff now," Denson shook his head. "You've gotten more kills in your first week than I got in half a year of combat. Relax!" He noticed the attention 187295 was focusing on his drink, "Its scumble. From some anomalous world they found way out near the Dark Matter Clouds. Want some?"
187295 shook his head, "No thank you, Sergeant."
Denson grinned, "So. I hear you've gotten a posting to my old unit. The 572nd. Good unit. They see a lot of action out on the front. So many kills that the Core send assassin squads after 'em on a regular basis." He took another drink of the scumble and started to look a little tipsy. "I'm going to see if I can find some more of this stuff. Good luck, kid!"
Denson staggered off and 187295 resumed his push towards his friend. Finally she saw him, and started pushing towards him. What really surprised him was when 175896 threw her arms around him in a hug that almost knocked him off his feet. He'd expected her to be happy to see him after that long presentation, but not this happy!
He returned her hug, more than a bit surprised at how strong she was. Work around the entry bay stopped for a moment, then the clones returned to whatever they'd been doing. He blushed as their gazes swept over him. Hrine hadn't had many experiences with things like this to pass on, being as caught up in revenge as he was.
She leaned back a bit and grinned at him, "We've got ten minutes to get settled into our cabins for launch. The captain's very strict about his schedual, so we'd better get moving. He was mad enough that I wanted to meet you down here."
187295 nodded. 175896's Golden Arm was poking into his chest a bit, but he didn't really mind. She'd been awarded it the previous night for her actions during the Core attack on Camp-05. Arm Command had liked some of the tactics she'd used a lot, and had promoted her to lead Gamma Platoon of the 572nd. 187295 had thought her hug last night was surprising enough, and he was still in shock from the news that 175896 was his CO.
He blinked again as the turbolift doors closed and the acceleration began. He hadn't even noticed that they were walking over, he'd been so caught up in his memories. Breifly, he wondered if his luggage had been stowed properly, then remembered that he didn't have any luggage. Arm clones on the front lines rarely owned anything, despite their high wages. They didn't have the time to buy things.
The lift stopped and they walked out into the ship's hallway. 187295 was momentarily disoriented. All the walls were carpeted, including the floor and ceiling, and all had lights embedded. There were only doors in the walls right now, but he was sure that some of the strange-looking bits of floor or ceiling would become doors once they were in space. The Arm had never seen the need to develop artificial gravity for its starships. Zero-G meant that space could be used much more effeciently. If gravity was needed, the ship just applied acceleration without dampning fields for however long and in whatever direction was needed.
A five-minute warning blared from a hidden loudspeaker just as they reached his door. 175896 turned towards him and smiled.
"If you need anything, I'm right next door," she hugged him again and he returned the hug. Then, in a move that surprised him even more than the news of their postings, she kissed him.
She gently broke away from his embrace and walked over to his own door. He noticed that she was blushing just as much as he was and smiled at her. She smiled back, then opened her door and was gone. He walked into his room in a daze and strapped himself into the launch webbing.
His thoughts wandered to the future. This posting was only the start. The 572nd was involved in most of the major actions on the front. Their current posting to Heaven's Cloud wouldn't last more than year, at most. Then they'd move on to another world. Either a strike against the Core or a defensive action further back in Arm space. Either way, they'd all get a lot of recognition. Who knew what would happen? And things seemed to be going well with 175896. He definatly had something more than a friend there, although exactly what he wasn't sure yet.
Then the iron hand of acceleration gripped him. AST 0567891 lifted off of Camp-05 in a blast of flame. Clearing the atmosphere in under a minute, it switched to antimatter drive. It climbed the gravity wells out of the system, accelerating all the way. After fifteen minutes, the gravitational effects of Camp-05's sun were almost negligible. Strange-looking pods deployed from the sides of the ship.
AST 0567891's antimatter generators dumped power into the pods. A lot of power had already been stored in them while the ship was docked at Camp-05, and now only a minuscule amount was needed. The ship's surface blurred, glowing a bright colour that shouldn't exist in this universe. Then it was gone, taking 187295 out into the galaxy and towards his future, whatever they might hold.
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Story originally written in WordPerfect 6.1 format by Sterling
HTML conversion & revision done on 4/18/1999 by Sterling
Document may be freely downloaded and/or distrubuted as long as this block remains unchanged and no modifications are made to the story.