Reactivated (Bolt Eaters Trilogy Book 1) Page 7
“That’s because you’re old, bitch,” Slate said.
“Not as old as you, asshole,” Crusher said.
“But I don’t look it,” Slate said. “And that’s the difference between Dickson, Marlborough and I. So I ain’t going.”
“I’ll go,” Eric said, looking directly at Frogger.
“What happened to the old adage we use among ourselves that one of us has to survive?” Frogger said.
“Both of us will,” Eric said. “We have to.”
Bambi sighed. She dropped her gaze to her feet, then looked up to stare Eric in the eye. “I guess I’m coming, too, you bastard.”
“Sorry,” Eric said, and meant it.
Crusher closed her eyes, and tilted her chin back. She shook her head, then opened her eyes. “Why’d you have to agree? I was happy to stay here with you for the rest of my life.”
“Again, I’m sorry,” Eric said. “I can’t let them go alone. I never really thought Eagleeye and Frogger were going to go through with it. But now that Sarge and Dickson have agreed, things just got real. They’re going. And so am I. I have to.”
Crusher folded her hands in her lap, then she gave Bambi an angry look. “Well I’m certainly not going to let you go alone with her.”
Bambi pursed her lips, and shrugged all innocent like.
Crusher gazed at Arnold defiantly. “So I’m in. Shit.”
One by one the rest of the Bolt Eaters agreed. Some eagerly, but most just as reluctantly as Bambi and Crusher.
Everyone, that is, except Slate.
All eyes turned on him.
Slate sighed. It was a rather heavy, rather extensive exhale of air. “Guess I’m in, too. Damn it.”
Arnold smiled proudly.
“Wipe that smirk off your face,” Slate snapped. “The only reason I’m going is because of them.” Slate jerked a thumb toward the rest of the team. “Not for you. Never for you. I owe you nothing. I’ve already died in service of your country. If I die now, it’s in their service.”
Arnold stared at him for a moment. “It’s not my country, you know, but ours. And our world.”
“Not mine,” Slate said. “Not anymore.”
Arnold gave him a curious look. “I’m not sure what to say to that.”
“Good,” Slate said. “Because you’re a bitch.”
“You won’t be able to talk to him like that for much longer, mate,” Dunnigan said. “So better enjoy it now while you can.”
“Oh, I know,” Slate said. He glanced at Arnold, and looked like he was about ready to unleash a litany of insults, but then thought better of it. He gazed at his comrades. “This isn’t my world. Because y’all are my world, now.”
“Aw, that’s sweet,” Bambi said.
“Yeah,” Slate said. “I know.” He was gazing at his hands; his voice sounded choked.
Arnold broke the uncomfortable silence that followed. “It’s done, then. Welcome back to the army. The Bolt Eaters are officially reactivated.”
“So what’s next?” Marlborough asked.
“We’re going to bring you to the processing center, where we’ll shut down your AI cores, take a current backup, and then load the cores into your new bodies,” Arnold explained.
“How do we know you won’t inject Containment Code into our AI cores when we’re offline?” Hicks said.
“I’ll add a section specifically mentioning that in your contracts, and have the Brass sign off on it,” Arnold said. “You’ll have to digitally sign the document before we begin the transference, of course. I’ll try to get it to you within the hour.”
“Tell me about our new bodies,” Dickson said.
“You’ll be loaded into modern Cicadas,” Arnold said. “Those Cicadas in turn will be inserted into the most powerful war machines the world has ever seen: the latest generation of mechs, modified with alien technology.”
Frogger’s face lit up. “Mechs?”
Arnold smiled, nodding.
8
Eric opened his eyes. Or rather, his cameras activated. He no longer had the eyelids of an android.
He examined his surroundings. He stood in a spacious compartment. The rounded shape of the ceiling told him he was probably inside one of the hangars he had spotted during the bus ride into the depot.
He looked down. He inhabited the body of a large mech. He knew immediately it was a Devastator model. Four meters tall and armed to the teeth.
At least he was still humanoid in shape. He raised his left arm, then the right. He formed a fist, and punched it into his opposite palm, producing a satisfyingly loud clang. He took one step forward, another, testing his balance. He instinctively knew how to keep his mass centered, which told him some custom routines had probably been injected into his AI core—he had agreed to the code addition when he signed the digital contract.
He confirmed that he still had full access to all of his emotions and mind subroutines—no Containment Code or Rules of Engagement had been forced upon him. He wouldn’t have put it past Arnold to pull something like that, despite the contract, and he was relieved that the lieutenant hadn’t betrayed them.
Eric glanced to either side, and realized his other teammates were inside Devastator models as well. They were similarly examining themselves. As expected, their faces were completely devoid of features—gray ovoids with a darker visor that emitted a line of blue light. On top of those ovoids were four antennae, reminding Eric of horns; there were also small, armored protrusions where the cameras resided, but that was the extent of it. There was no way to convey emotions with faces like that.
“Well, well, well,” Dunnigan said, his voice coming over the shared comm band utilized by the mechs. “We’re back in the game, blokes.” Dunnigan’s avatar appeared in the lower right of Eric’s HUD when he spoke. He seemed excited.
So that was how they would convey emotions.
“Hey, you guys see that shit?” Slate said, his face also materializing. “We gots little expressive avatars on our HUDs. That’s new.”
“Oh joy,” Traps said. “I was kind of looking forward to not having to see any of your ugly faces.”
“Guess I’ll have to work on my poker face,” Tread said.
“You can turn the feature off, I think,” Frogger said. He paused, as if checking. “Yeah, you can. Navigate to Settings on your HUD, and you’ll find it under Comm Link, Enable Avatars.”
“Back in the game…” Eagleeye said. “Kind of makes you think.”
“About what, mate?” Dunnigan said.
“Remember how Arnold told us he’d be taking precautionary backups of our minds while we were offline, before loading us into the mechs?” Eagleeye said. “And that we wouldn’t even know if we’d been restored? This could be the fiftieth time we’ve attempted the mission. Or the hundredth. Thousandth even.”
“That’s right, go and kill team morale right after the lot of us wake up,” Hicks said. “And we were off to such a good start before you opened your mouth.”
“I don’t have a mouth anymore,” Eagleeye said. “None of us do.”
“And I must scream,” Frogger said.
“Huh?” Slate said.
“Uh, never mind, classical literature,” Frogger said.
As Eric examined the rest of the team, he realized that not all of them were inside Devastator models after all.
Traps had a Rambler, a two-legged, armless model. Tread resided within a Rhino model, a quadruped. Bambi, meanwhile, occupied a Crab, a unit that lived up to its name with those eight legs and the claws at the forefront. They all had weapons mounted on either side of their torsos, or in Bambi’s case, the head section. She also had a tail with three wicked-looking metallic barbs protruding from the tip.
“Gah, this is weird,” Bambi said. “I definitely don’t like being a giant spider.”
“Suits you,” Tread said. “We used to call you the black widow, remember? Because of the way you chewed up us guys and spat us out when you were done.”
“Your new form certainly packs a punch,” Tread said. “I’d hate to mess with you.”
“I ain’t scared of no spider,” Slate said.
“Yeah?” Bambi said. “Come on, let’s go, then.”
“Like I’m going to tussle with you now,” Slate said. “I just got my new threads here. Not in the mood to mess up my mech just yet.”
“Look at her tail,” Dunnigan said. “She looks more like a scorpion than a spider. We might have to switch up her alias.”
“Sorry, Scorpion is already taken,” Eric said.
Crusher walked her mech toward Bambi. “How are you using the extra legs?”
“It’s simple, really,” Bambi said. “I just know how to move them instinctively.”
“Part of the extra subroutines they inserted into your movement core,” Eric said. “As per the contract.”
“Yeah, in the contract it said that custom code may be inserted,” Bambi said. “I never expected that they actually would insert anything, given the lieutenant’s promise that there wouldn’t be any Containment Code.”
“I’ll run a log for you,” Frogger said. “Make sure nothing else was put in.”
“Thank you,” Bambi said.
“There’s no Containment Code in any of you, nor enforced Rules of Engagement, as agreed,” Arnold said, walking confidently into the hangar from a side door. He was wearing AR goggles, which no doubt facilitated his communication on the same comm band the mechs were using. He also had an avatar show up in the lower right of Eric’s HUD—the expressions matched his real face perfectly.
“Better watch yourself, little man,” Slate said from his towering mech. “You’re like a soft little ant to us. Hell, you’re so small, we almost can’t see you. We might accidentally squish your ass. I wouldn’t get too close if I were you.”
Given the current size of their mechs, Arnold looked more like a dwarf than an ant, but Slate had a penchant for hyperbole. Still, his words had the desired effect, because Arnold stopped dead in his tracks next to the side door, and gave them all an uneasy look. The former confidence had left him: Eric had the impression Arnold was ready to run out of there at a moment’s notice, not that it would help: the mechs could easily smash through the hangar walls. Then again, while there might not be any Containment Code, no doubt there was a failsafe built into the mech’s themselves that would allow the lieutenant to freeze all communications between the AI cores and mech bodies if need-be.
Arnold cleared his throat. “As I was saying, the only code we’ve added is for the operation of your new bodies and the different weapon systems associated with them. But by all means, feel free to perform complete system scans and diagnostics.”
“Oh, we will,” Slate said.
“While there might not be any Containment Code, I’m sure you’ve still inserted some fail-safes into the mechs themselves,” Frogger said, given voice to Eric’s own thoughts.
Arnold shrugged, but had no further comment.
“Before we go any further, straight up, how many times have we died on this mission?” Eagleeye asked.
“Straight up?” Arnold replied. “We haven’t sent you yet.”
“Well that’s a relief,” Bambi said. “Sort of. Is there any way I can request a transfer to a Devastator model? Or any other model than a Crab?”
“Sorry,” Arnold said. He glanced at Traps, Tread and Bambi. “The three of you are equipped with specialized equipment that can’t be carried by a Devastator, either due to size, or power restrictions. I’ll be going over that equipment momentarily, but in the meantime take heart in the fact that there are Cicada models embedded not just in the Devastator cockpits, but yours, too: if you three ever find yourselves longing for your humanoid bodies, simply eject the Cicada models and spend some time in more familiar bodies.”
As soon as he finished the last word, Traps, Tread and Bambi all promptly ejected; from the centers of their bodies, small spheres jettisoned. Arms and legs emerged from the spheres, and a torso and head uncurled so that by the time they landed they were in humanoid form. The Cicadas were a little bigger than Arnold, but still dwarfed next to the mechs that sourced them, of course.
Tread lifted a robotic limb. “No weapons?”
“Each Cicada has a built-in P-21 plasma rifle and a L-52 laser,” Arnold said.
From Tread’s right forearm a small laser turret emerged, while in the left a plasma rifle unfolded.
“Nice,” Tread said.
“That’s about the only armaments we could fit into these particular units and still have them compact enough to squeeze into the cockpits,” Arnold said.
“I can still add a heavy gun mount if I want, yeah?” Brontosaurus asked.
“In the storage compartments of your mechs there are different Cicada arm attachments, yes,” Arnold said. “Including a pair of H-97 heavy lasers.”
“Now that’s what I’m talking about,” Brontosaurus said.
“I’m sure you’ll find the armaments of your mechs to be far more appealing,” Arnold said. He raised a hand and with a gesture caused an overlay to appear on Eric’s HUD. It showed a Devastator mech in wireframe form, with the weapons highlighted a dark red. Likely the same overlay appeared on all of their HUDs, because of what Slate said next.
“Hey,” Slate said. “I didn’t get no overlay request.”
“I’m using the standard AR ad overlay protocol,” Arnold said. “The same protocol vendors and storefronts use when you’re wandering through town.”
“Guess I should switch on my ad overlays…” Brontosaurus said.
“Before moving onto the mech armaments, I wanted to mention: these machines are self sufficient when it comes to power generation,” Arnold said. “The hull coating is designed to absorb solar power, so you won’t have to lug around big power cells with you to recharge.”
“Well that’s a nice change,” Bambi said. “There is a lot of sunlight where we’re going, after all.”
“There is,” Arnold agreed. “At least during the day.”
In the preliminary briefing, Eric learned the planet was tentatively called Banthar X. Humanity wasn’t sure yet if the planet had different temperate zones, but where the Bolt Eaters would be arriving had days that were thirty-six hours long, while the nights lasted fifty-two hours. The temperature drops were quite precipitous during the night, and so Arnold recommended that the Bolt Eaters hunker down during that time, conserving energy until morning. Apparently it got so cold that sometimes methane snow would fall. It wasn’t pure methane, of course, but a compound of various alkanes and other molecules that raised the freezing point well above methane alone. The atmospheric pressure was about half that of Earth at sea level, and the gravity was slightly heavier at one point two Gs.
“We’ve timed your arrival with morning,” Arnold said. “So you should have at least thirty-five hours of daylight to work with.”
The team had five of those alien days, or roughly three weeks in Earth time, to return. If they didn’t report in, then another Bolt Eater team would be assembled, made of their most recent backups. Arnold would be opening the wormhole every six hours until then, giving them a chance to return.
“Let’s go over the weapon systems,” Arnold said. “You’ve probably guessed, given the nature of the mission, that we’ve removed anything that requires ammunition, and replaced it with laser and plasma equivalents, or alien technology. That means no missile or grenade systems, but in their places you’ve all got experimental shoulder mounted energy cannons on your right shoulders.”
“Sweet,” Slate said. “We all get alien tech this time, not just Scorp and Brontosaurus, the bitches.”
Arnold gave him a cross look before continuing. “You also have twin alien s
pears located in your right forearms. These can be extended and retracted at will, by squeezing the fist and focusing.”
Eric instinctively knew what to do. Or rather, the code injected into his AI core did: he squeezed his fist, focused, and two long blades protruded from his forearm, reaching well past his hand.
“I feel like Wolverine,” Eric said.
“Hell yeah,” Frogger said. “We just need to curve them a little and we’re good to go.”
“Wolver who?” Dickson said.
“We could start our own team of superheroes,” Mickey said. “Instead of the X-Men, we’ll be the Mech-Men.”
“You three and your twentieth century pop culture references,” Eagleeye said.
“Yeah, no doubt,” Slate said. “How’d you guys like it if I started making jokes about the Purple Jackal and his band of merry Marionettes?”
“Ah, I love Purple Jackal!” Crusher said. “We’re exactly like his team!”
“I see what you mean,” Frogger commented.
“Yeah, see how annoying it is?” Slate said.
Arnold cleared his throat. “The spears are located in protective shells that will protect you from their voltage inducing effects. But be careful not to touch them with any other part of your body, or you’ll disable yourself. These spears are the fastest way to drain Banthar energy fields, by the way. The energy cannons are a moderate second, while lasers and plasmas are a distant third.”
“Can we launch the spears?” Slate said.
“You can,” Arnold said. “But once launched, you’ll have to retrieve them before you can use them again. And to do that, you’ll have to jettison your Cicada, and retrieve the special collection gloves in your storage compartments. Moving on to the remainder of your weapons systems… in the left arm you have a swivel mount capable of deploying either a PR-97 plasma weapon or a body-height ballistic shield. In the right, you have a ZX-19 laser cannon. There is no secondary weapon or shield in that arm, because of the alien spears embedded within.”
Arnold glanced at Traps, Tread, and Bambi. “The three of you have the same weapons, though yours are mounted on either side of your torsos. Or in Bambi’s case, the head. Bambi also has three spears forming the barbs of her tail. Trap and Tread don’t have alien spears, but you do have energy cannons.”