Tech World Page 17

“I’m feeling the love, here,” I said. “Now, give me a range to that subway entrance a block west.”

  “One-point four,” he said after playing with the goggles for a second. “These things are great. They take all the guess work out—holy shit!”

  I didn’t even ask what he was talking about. I swiveled smoothly, aiming my projector down into the streets.

  The Tau were boiling up out of the subway. The street filled with flickering shadows like blurs of somber color.

  “Targets sighted, command,” I said into my headset. “Do I have permission to fire?”

  “How many have you got on your side of the building, McGill?” Graves asked in my ear.

  “Looks like all of them, sir.”

  “Roger that. Same thing on the other side. Take them out before they reach the building. We can’t let them get inside the barricades downstairs.”

  The leading elements of the charge were already roaring forward and hitting the base of the pyramid I sat upon.

  I took a deep breath and squeezed the trigger-bars with my gauntlets. The 88 didn’t make a loud sound when it fired, but a lot of hot air blasted out of the thing’s sides. Carlos was caught by surprise and almost had his goggles blown off his head.

  The biggest problem with large-scale plasma weapons when used in an atmosphere was the overproduction of heat. My 88 was no exception to that rule. It seemed to generate almost as much heat from the housing as it did from the muzzle. Like the machineguns of the past, the metal swelled up and the entire thing could malfunction from overuse. As I didn’t have any barrels to change out, I had to make sure it didn’t get too hot.

  The meter was tapped into my HUD and displayed inside my visor. The first blaze of plasma only lasted about a second, and by the end of it the temperature was already up into the yellow zone on my internal monitors.

  Using the burst as efficiently as I could, I swept the beam in a broad swath across the mob at the base of the building. They were so bunched up I couldn’t miss. How many did I kill? I’m not sure. Maybe a thousand—but probably less.

  I doubted this crowd had ever seen that level of firepower before, and they reeled back in shock. It had to be a surprise to see twenty ranks ahead of you turn to ash all at once with nothing but a cloud of hot gas and seared individuals at the edge of the kill-zone to clue you in as to what had just happened.

  My weapon cycled up to a full charge again, and the temperature fell into the green—but I held my fire.

  Graves noticed immediately that I’d stopped firing. “McGill? Are you injured?”

  “Negative sir.”

  “Why aren’t you firing your weapon?”

  “They’re falling back, sir.”

  And they were. They were stumbling, reeling, and dragging their dead toward the subway entrance.

  “Are they dragging wounded?” he asked.

  “Uh, yes sir.”

  “Good, all right. Hold onto that cannon of yours for a second.”

  I heard him then, up along the rim of the building’s roof. He ordered a unit of light troops to the edge. I saw them hustle and kneel there, aiming down into the crowd. Graves was the senior Centurion present, and he had been put in charge of the defending units.

  Light weapons began to chatter.

  “Snap-rifles?” Carlos asked. He gazed down into the streets. “They’re chewing them up.”

  I felt a little sick. It was one thing to burn down a raging mass of enemy troops who were hell-bent on killing you—it was quite another to shoot retreating civvies in the back.

  Slapping the release on my harness, I climbed out of the bunker and walked along the wall to Graves’ position.

  “There you are,” he said. “Do you know what I’m doing, McGill?”

  “Killing retreating civvies, sir?”

  He glanced at me in irritation. “No. I’m wounding them. These troops are aiming low.”

  I looked up and down the line. It was true, the light troops had their sniper barrels attached and were popping single rounds down, choosing their targets with care.

  “An army seeks to wound opponents,” Graves told me with the air of one delivering a lecture. “That’s preferable to killing them. Each wounded enemy takes another man to care for him.”

  “The Tau don’t have a big history of caring for their fellows,” I pointed out.

  “True enough. But maybe they’ll become demoralized and less wildly excited about charging us.”

  “I see, sir.”

  “You don’t approve?”

  “That’s not my place, sir. I’m not in command here.”

  Graves looked at me. I avoided his eyes and stared down into the streets. The civvies were falling back being driven underground like animals. Hundreds of wounded lay squirming all over the streets.

  “That’s right, you’re not in command,” Graves said sharply. “And you never will be if you don’t learn a few things.”

  “Can I ask a question, sir?”

  “If you must.”

  “What’s so important about this particular building?”

  “It’s an armory. A government armory.”

  Shocked, I turned my full attention to the centurion. “A government armory? Why are we the ones protecting it?”

  “You’d think that the government forces would be more interested in doing so, wouldn’t you? Well, they’re not. They work for pay, and are willing to take a certain degree of risk. But they were unnerved by this crazy crowd. They abandoned the district hours before we got here.”

  The streets were empty now except for the crawling injured and the smoldering dead.

  “We can’t let these crazies have real weapons,” I said. “They’ll be unstoppable.”

  “Now you understand the true importance of our defensive mission.”

  “Yes sir, I do.”

  “Can I ask you a question, McGill?”

  “Of course, Centurion.”

  “The next time I order you to kill a thousand murderous hostiles—civvies or not—will you follow that order instead of fucking around?”

  There was sudden vehemence in his statement. He was pissed off, and he had a good point. Our eyes met.

  “Yes sir,” I said. “Sorry sir.”

  Graves’ attention drifted back toward the streets below which were nearly quiet now. “That was only the first wave,” he said. “Their ranks have swollen but their weaponry hasn’t. Only one out of twenty of them have a real weapon. They must capture this armory.”

  I nodded grimly. “I understand. They won’t get past me, sir.”

  “Excellent. Back to your post, Specialist.”

  -20-

  Our district of the city fell silent for the next few hours. The power went out late, then came back on, then went out again.

  I didn’t think orbital megahabs were built to operate without power—and I was right. When everything shut down, ominous groaning and grinding sounds began emanating from the roof-vents. I knew these noises were bubbling up from the distant machinery below the streets.

  When the generators died the second time, the city streets fell into a strange twilight. The city itself was as black as space, but beams of overly brilliant starlight streamed in from outside the station cutting like cold lasers through the gloom. After a few more hours, the air became stale and the whole place seemed haunted.

  By listening to reports from other parts of the city, I came to fully understand how badly this battle was going. It was our side that had cut the power hoping to slow the rioters down—but apparently it wasn’t working. The enemy was advancing all over the city. They seemed unstoppable.

  Once again, I found myself wondering where Old Silver was. He had to be out there somewhere. Was he working with the Tau openly? I didn’t trust that man in any way, shape, or form. He’d known too much about this rebellion from the beginning.

  At about midnight Natasha showed up and stuck a tablet in my face. It showed a graphic app depicting Tau attire. You could flick
your finger over it and change their dress to anything you wanted, and a caption would appear underneath telling you what it meant.

  “Cool vid game,” I said. “Did you figure anything out?”

  “Try the app,” she said, pushing it into my hands. “Make it look like one of the rebels.”

  I sighed and did as she asked. I toyed with the app, but I soon found myself frustrated.

  “It doesn’t seem to work,” I said. “The maroon and silver—you can’t select that.”

  “That’s right,” she said. “I don’t know why, but apparently no one ever chooses that combination. Either that or the app designers don’t know what it means.”

  “Huh,” I said, shrugging. “That’s weird.”

  Natasha rolled her eyes. “It’s not just weird, James. It’s part of the answer.”

  “What answer?”

  “The answer to why these people are acting so oddly.”

  I frowned, chewing that one over. “Are you saying that if we could get these clowns to change their holographic clothing back to normal they’d settle down?”

  “I’m not sure, but I’m trying to figure that out.”

  “We should tell someone about this,” said Carlos, leaning his big face in between us.

  I pushed him back with my hand. “No you don’t. This is Natasha’s find. She’ll take it to the brass herself and get the credit.”

  He glared at both of us. “How the hell am I supposed to get rank if you guys won’t cut me a break?”

  “Do something useful,” I suggested.

  “I’m going to do just that. I’m gonna take a leak over the side of this building.” He stalked off into the night.

  “Take the app to Graves,” I told Natasha.

  “I already did. He said he’d mention it in his next report to the Primus.”

  “That sounds like bullshit,” I said.

  “Yeah.”

  I thought hard for a second then came to a decision. The more I thought about it, the more this tidbit of information seemed critical. Legion Varus was losing this fight, and we needed an edge to change the tide. Understanding the cause of the uncharacteristically violent behavior of the Tau might be just what we needed.

  “I’m going to contact Tribune Drusus,” I said. “He told me to tell him if something like this ever came up. I’m not sure he really meant that, but he can always give me the finger if he wants to.”

  “James, he told you that during a different campaign on another planet.”

  “Yeah, well…I finally got around to it.”

  Natasha looked nervous. “You’re really going to walk right over Adjunct Leeson, Centurion Graves, and our new primus?”

  “Why not?”

  “I’m not sure I want my name on this anymore.”

  “Why’s everyone a chicken when it comes to talking to officers?” I asked.

  “Because they can execute us.”

  “Been there,” I said. “It’s not that bad.”

  She laughed and handed me the tablet. “Be my guest, James.”

  I smiled at her. “Give me a kiss for luck?”

  She hesitated, then did it. I wouldn’t call it a lingering, passionate kiss, but it was the real deal. I wondered if this particular copy of my body, within which my consciousness currently resided, might get lucky before I got him blown up somehow.

  “Damn you,” she said almost to herself. Then she left.

  Looking at the tablet, I tapped at it again trying to get the configuration right. I couldn’t do it. There was no maroon suit—no silver shoes, either.

  Sucking in a deep breath, I contacted the Legion commander, Tribune Drusus. I was shocked when he answered my text immediately with a voice channel. I touched a glowing dot on my tapper and heard a familiar sonorous voice in my ear piece.

  “McGill? Are you overrun at your position?”

  “No sir. Everything’s quiet here.”

  “A social call then? There’s a battle going on in two districts. I don’t have time—”

  “Sir,” I said. “I wouldn’t contact you to ask you out to dinner—not today, anyway.”

  “All right then,” he said after a moment’s hesitation. “What have you got?”

  Talking quickly, I told him about Natasha’s discovery concerning the Tau holo-clothing. He listened politely but didn’t seem impressed.

  “I’m failing to see the significance of this discovery interesting though it is,” the Tribune told me. “It’s only logical to me that the rebels would choose a non-standard set of colors to identify one another on the battlefield.”

  “I think it’s more than that, sir,” I said. “The Tau use their appearance to project mood and to infect one another with their thoughts. Every color combination they wear is significant. This one is unknown to us, but Specialist Elkin believes they’re spreading the rebellion with these colors, signaling others to join them.”

  “I didn’t say that!” Natasha hissed behind me.

  I waved her off and listened to the tribune.

  “Hmm,” Drusus said. “That’s an interesting idea. We’re new here, and I do recall that the Tau present emotion, mood, and intent with their colors. They used to do it with physical dress but now use these holographic projections. You’re saying that if we changed their projections we could quell these riots?”

  “I don’t know, sir,” I admitted. “But it’s got to be worth investigating. We can’t kill every civvy on this station.”

  “You’re right about that. They outnumber us by about a hundred thousand to one. All right, hold your position. When your current mission is complete, I’m giving your unit new orders to investigate the matter.”

  “Uh, thanks sir. We’d be glad to help—but isn’t there a tech unit that would be better suited to—?”

  “No, there isn’t anyone else I can spare. Besides, I think learning the truth of the matter will require a full combat team before you’re done.”

  “How long is our current mission going to last, sir?” I asked.

  “I suspect it will all be over by morning.”

  Drusus closed the channel, and I was left frowning down into the dark streets.

  “What’d he say?” Natasha asked.

  “We’re going to be reassigned. We’ll be sleuths after we’re relieved from our position up here.”

  “You’ve got to be kidding me! You went over Graves’ head, and now he’ll be slapped with new orders because of it? He’s not going to like that.”

  “Yeah,” I agreed, but I barely cared about Graves’ feelings. I was more concerned about what we’d been asked to do next. I’d been hoping to pass the matter off to a team of techs—maybe a full unit of them—but apparently Drusus didn’t have the resources free for that.

  For some reason, I never even questioned Drusus about his declaration that our current assignment would be at an end by morning. I’d simply figured we would be relieved by another contingent of troops by that time. I found out just before dawn that that wasn’t what he’d meant at all.

  The Tau began boiling up out of the subway again, and an alarm sang in our helmets. I hated to admit it, but I’d nodded off in my harness. Carlos rapped his knuckles on my helmet making a loud knocking noise.

  “We’re in business again, ace,” he said.

  I stifled a yawn and sat up, my heart pounding. With bleary eyes, I swung the muzzle of my 88 downward. I twitched it a little to the left as it had drifted and I squeezed the dual triggers.

  Smooth, bright death reached down and swept away an unknowable number of Tau. But this time, they didn’t fall back. They charged forward climbing over mounds of steaming dead.

  Surprised, I rotated the gun on its tracks. The system whirred and clicked. I had to draw a fresh line across the boiling horde of enemies starting farther forward this time.

  “You’re too far to the right with the muzzle!” Carlos shouted. “You’ll burn open street instead of targets!”

  He was right. I could see th
at immediately. But there wasn’t time to correct. They were already racing to the base of the building. I struggled to adjust my aim while Carlos shoved a fresh cartridge into the base of the weapon and slapped my shoulder to indicate I was free to fire.

  The 88 was an odd weapon. It wasn’t like operating something as simple as a heavy machine gun. It could only fire in short bursts before recycling and cooling the plasma chamber. You couldn’t hose down everything in sight. You had to preplan your shots and you couldn’t afford to miss.

  I squeezed the triggers, splashing my beam down on empty puff-crete. Such was the power of the beam that it vaporized a broad swathe of the street’s surface, burning about an inch into one of the hardest substances in the known universe.

  “Dammit,” I said, straining to swing the muzzle back on target. I was partially successful, and Carlos helped by kicking the chassis and nudging me further into line.

  The beam finally struck the enemy wave with half the charge expended on nothing. I could tell I was hitting troops as the expanding gases far below on the street changed from dark and thin to roiling gray-white. That was steam, I realized. Steam from the bodies of the massed Tau I was annihilating.

  “They made it to the barriers,” Carlos said, lying on his belly and aiming his extruding goggles down the long sloping side of the building. “There’s too many—they’ll break in, you’ll have to sweep the base of the building.”

  “Roger that,” I said, tilting the muzzle downward until I was staring directly down the side of the building. It felt like I was going to slide off and fall into the middle of them.

  Carlos got to his knees quickly and fed me another cartridge. The 88 swallowed that, and the temperature indicators fell from red to orange and down, slowly, into the green.

  I’d lined up for my third sweep by this time. It was going to be a difficult one as I’d have to change angles in the middle to go around the corner of the building. But if I could pull it off, I was pretty sure I could repel—

  I got no further in thought or action. A blinding light and a crackling feeling of current ran through me.

  For an instant, my world was whiteness and seemed to be spinning. Something hot was in my face, and I tried to push away from it but the harness I was in kept me held there like glue.