CHAPTER 4
I should have known it was going to happen.
Tailor-made revelation could not have fit tighter. Cinched around my throat and closing tighter every day since.
The past with its all knowing measuring tape reveals tiny, candid features on a woman's face that a man in love is completely blind to. At this point, fate ties the measuring tape into a knot until air quits coming out.
Alice rolls over in her sleep. Her soft breath on my neck is the tumbling down of towers. All of her fingertips touch me. I close my eyes and it's finally okay to die. This is when the knot ties quietly. The neon lights of Haven peep through the sides of the window shade. Even as the rays of dawn try to steal the light, the city never sleeps.
"Kax", she whispers my first name close to my ear. I move my face to touch hers. Her lips kiss my earlobe. I thought she was asleep. Her hand leaves my chest and presses my cheek until my three days lack of shaving meets her perfect face. This when the knot goes tighter.
"What are we fighting for anymore?" She asks and the ocean flows over every man's city. Tighter
I knew the answer before she asked. It was one of the only things that made sense since the day that I enlisted with the IMC. The answer was in every deadly pull of a trigger and the answer was in every bullet that ripped into my muscle tissue. "I fight for you Alice."
Her silence is the life sentence on death row. The still waters of the ocean when the moon has been blown out of the sky. Tighter.
At the moment everything is drowned underwater and choked with everything every sin we deserved to commit, she says, "How many people have you killed for me Kax?" Tighter.
"I don't know, I would do it all again four times more if you wanted me too."
Alice takes her face away from mine and the stars blot out. She raises herself above and looks down with her hand heavy on my chest. "I've killed for you Kax. I even enjoyed it. But where does it end? When do we wash this blood," she held up her hand in the dark and I am alone on the ocean. "This blood may never come off our hands." Tighter.
"We are the only ones that can establish peace on the frontier. You and me Alice. No matter what the Militia says the IMC is the only entity that has the power and the conviction to make sure law and order is preserved." I am the only tree coming out of the ocean, with tailor's tape around the trunk.
"There you go again with the ideology we've been spoon fed for years," says Alice's nails deep in my muscle. "You're not even listening to what I'm saying. It's this war Kax, what is it doing to us?" Tighter.
Making us stronger, I want to say. This war is worth every man, woman, and child that I have ended because I would have never met you otherwise. I am the first leaf falling on this new, wild frontier.
"This war is killing us." I say these words to go past Alice's face and I say it to my demons chuckling in the shadows. For once, they stop and listen.
"Kax, we can't keep getting into those Titans. We've seen our friends die in . . . ways too horrible to describe. I can't bear the thought of losing you." Tighter.
"I don't know what I would do if I lost you Alice. You are my universe—my Frontier, brave and free." I touch her face and a homestead is built with crops and animals by the front door.
Alice's hand clasps mine. Children play with blonde hair like hers in the dirt yard and their smiles are unpaid repentance.
"Let's leave then."
I can't breathe.
"Let's leave all this Kax. No more war, no more killing. I can't sleep anymore and I feel Titan controls in my hands when I do doze off. I relive everything-every single terrible thing I have done." She is crying. Her tears course the canyons of my fingers.
A fire is burning my lungs, I cannot tell if they are swelling or shrinking. The crops burn black smoke and the children scream. I want to claw my throat out but her tears are a thousand pounds.
"Kax? Please say something, I need you to say something!"
What we have made can be rebuilt. But can we truly be reborn?
"One more mission." I hear someone with my voice speaking to Alice.
"Why not now? This is our last night of leave. We won't return back to the HS Havoc."
"Our friends need us Alice. Are we just going to leave Harris, Gracie, and Varner on their own? The Militia is getting stronger and . . ."
"Does it matter who wins? Does anything matter? Who makes the rules is whoever has the most blood on their hands." Alice reaches through the dark. Through the infinite universe and places her warm hand on my face and now she can feel tears. "And we have enough blood on our hands Kax, to make OUR rules."
Slowly her face lowers and we close our eyes. A rumbling is thundering through the darkness. Prepare for titanfall in four, three, two, one . . .
The earth and snow shatters and I am knocked away from the barrel. I still felt a phantom pressure on my lips. That dull ache transplanted all over my body when I saw an Ogre Titan squatting in the middle of the square. The dome shield stayed up. It must have been called in by the pilot with the smart pistol that met her demise only a few moments ago. I scrambled to my feet. I yelled at the last of my men and robots.
"Everyone get inside and get to cover NOW!"
I heard the dome shield evaporate and the function of machinery. The automated Ogre reached behind its back and revealed a 40 mm cannon.
Damn
I ran inside the building and shouted for everyone to get out their Anti-Titan weapons. Inside were sacks of minerals and drill bits for mining. This camp may have at one time been for the extraction of minerals, but it was quickly turning into a gravesite. The last grunt ran in and the frame of the door exploded into shrapnel and wood. The cannon's explosive shells could demolish us all by the end of the clip if I didn't move fast enough. Another round ripped through the wall and detonated a stack of grey powder. If our IMC uniforms were not already grey, everyone now was ghost.
My cloak was recharged and it would be easy to mount up on the back of the Ogre and take out the internal systems but the Milita had staged this attack knowing that very few human pilots remained in the IMC. I had already faced down two pilots, there was no telling how many more might be crawling around out there. The cloak on my pilot outfit was meant to fool Titan optics, not human visual targeting systems. If I went out onto the back of that Ogre with no support I would be a sitting duck for anybody with an itchy trigger finger. Another blast went through the wooden walls and two Spectres disintegrated into pieces. The automated Ogre was going to systematically shoot the place full of holes until nothing more came out. The grunts were firing archer rockets in pairs and the Spectres unloaded whole sidewinder clips into the big Titan's shields. But they were fighting with the equivalent of pea shooters.
A 40 mm round went through a window in front of me and a woman's head disappeared from her shoulders. I saw her holding the archer rocket on her shoulder without a head for a moment before the cannon blast sent shrapnel all around us. Her body sank to the ground and another grunt did not even dare reach for the rocket launcher.
I still had not seen Sergeant Dubois since the surprise attack with the Atlas Titan. I was the IMC rank here but pilots operated as an independent arm of the corporation's military and we were not exactly supposed to be leaders to slow grunts. I pointed at the scared grunt.
"Pick up that Archer and fire that rocket. You know she would have wanted you too."
He did pick up the launcher and another explosion sent screams and shrapnel behind me. I had to get us out of here but I could see no way out. There was no back door and only a side door that the Ogre would see. At that point it would quit wasting ammunition and crush the meager IMC forces like helpless ants.
Suddenly, a deep, brutish voice said to my ear, "HS Havoc is over your position Boss. Do you need me, sir?"
"Sid! It's good to hear you. Can you bring the chain gun?"
"I can Boss but scans indicate multiple titanfalls in your combat zone."
"Alright, keep the quad rocket. I need you in a hurry."
I looked out one of the holes made by the 40 mm cannon. My helmet sequenced the location and I pressed the button by my chin strap.
"Coordinates registered." Sid said. "Warpfall Transmitter engaged. Prepare for titanfall in two, one-"
The sonic boom of a Warpfall Transmitter doesn't annihilate the ear drums of everyone present until one point eight four seconds after the Titan has hit the ground. The drop of 19 tons of metal and fire happens so fast the human eye has a high level of difficulty detecting what it sees. One second, an Ogre Titan is standing in front of the building, the very next second, my Stryder Titan sat in the lava melted ground. The smaller titan fell so fast that the arms and legs of the Ogre were still standing with only hot, orange metal glistening in the air. The automatic dome shield took over and the Ogre's arms and legs collapsed.
The grunts gave a loud cheer and pumped their fists in the air. I ordered the next highest ranked soldier to come find me. Corporal Beddington, a wiry woman with ashen eyes saluted me the way that Sergeant Dubois used to.
"If there are other titans out there, I need your squad to push out and provide support either from ground or second floor. Push out and take all three buildings if you can. I don't know if more troops will be coming."
"Roger that, sir. Good hunting out there."
I hit the cloak and disappeared from in front of her.
On the porch the snow was falling heavier by the minute. The flakes of snow would stick onto the dome shield and then melt. Lines of water ran down the blue orb in a beautiful cascade. No gunfire echoed in the mining square but I heard the sounds of titans, drop pods, and drop ships breaking through the atmosphere. The Militia wanted one of their signature ambushes but I had survived. The IMC survives until it does what it does best-overwhelm.
The Stryder Titan held out its hand and I jumped into the metal palm. The cockpit opened and I was placed in the seat. Encased in iron and shields, my cockpit displays came on. I slid my arms and legs into place at the controls and made the twenty-four foot tall Titan stand. From the back, the Stryder pulled out the Quad Rocket Launcher that fired four Hellfire rockets at time. Dash kits primed, cluster missile armed, vortex shield on standby, strategic battle map online, and one emotionally disturbed pilot at the helm.
"Greetings, Lieutenant Autto," Sid growled. "We have a body count to fill."
I studied the layout of the mountain range when Captain Blisk's voice demanded. "What's going on down there eh? We are picking up massive amounts of Militia signatures in your airspace."
"Sir, they staged an ambush and wiped out half of us. I'm in need of titan support—"
"Already on their way Lieutenant. Two automated titans and two racks of Spectres. I also mobilized a squad of pilots from the 8th Squadron to back you up down there. Hold out until their drop ships arrive. The Militia wants a fight, they are going to get one."
"Understood, sir." I began moving my Stryder out of the blood stained mining square. The IMC grunts and Spectres were moving out of the damaged building and pressing into small arms fire. I wished Corporal Beddington and her remaining soldiers luck.
My titan was an extension of me. I stood on the snowy ridge and saw an Atlas Titan trudging over trees. I couldn't tell what weapon it had but numerous Militia grunts and Spectres scuttled around its feet.
"Warning-" Sid said, "you are outnumbered two to one."
"Where—?" then I saw a Stryder rushing up the north side of the valley about to push into the flank of the town.
"Sid, paint this valley as an IMC landing zone. I want to put us right on top of them." This type of fighting wasn't about sneaking or bringing a surprise. My Stryder boosted off the ridge and sprinted right for the middle. Welcome to fist city.
Two Ogres dropped from the sky and stood in the middle of the valley in front of me. They turned to the Atlas and opened fire. The pilot inside was smart enough to try ducking behind trees to dodge the hail of chain gun and plasma railgun fire. The shields on the side of one of the automated Ogres went under assault by the three round burst of a 40 mm cannon. It came from the flanking Stryder. This was just what I wanted.
Automated Titans were as slow as dried toothpaste on a sink. Rookie pilots could spin an automated titan like a top if it didn't have a Guardian Chip or the Andromeda Relay. The Guardian Chip was designed to have an auto-titan protect and defend a friendly pilot on the ground. The Andromeda Relay was something else entirely. The Andromeda Relay was fished out of the burning rubble of the IMC's main corporate robotics facility on the Frontier. They had just finished it and were about to mainstream that combat system into every Spectre and Titan in the IMC. It tripled the normal reaction rate and aggression in the soulless counterparts of the IMC mechanized war machine. The Andromeda Relay picked up Milita movements, in correlation with battlefield terrain, "reacted" to incoming fire, and immediately devised defensive strategies while simultaneously calculating counter-attack maneuvers while the battle was happening. The IMC may have been on the defense, but little men in lab coats could make big, bad machines.
So the IMC Ogre equipped with the Andromeda Relay did not just slowly pivot and take the brunt of the 40 mm cannon fire. It grabbed a tree by the trunk and ripped it out of the ground when the Stryder fired again. The Ogre used the tree as a shield as the burst fire ripped apart the wood. Needless to say the old tree was obliterated by the blasts but that gave the IMC Ogre the open target with its X0-16 Chain gun.
The Milita Stryder boosted a long side step but right into my rocket salvo. The pilot inside panicked because all the shields are obliterated and it's two versus one in open ground, it dashed away but I give chase. I lay into the light class titan with every shot of the quad rocket. I anticipated its movements. Flames shot out of its spent boosters, the legs are wobbling and the Milita pilot is crazy enough to try and fire one more burst of the 40mm cannon. The shells actually caught me by surprise in the face of my Stryder. Sid tells me the shields are down but I pull the trigger of the Quad Rocket one last time.
All four of the spiraling rockets slam into the Stryder's torso. The cockpit erupts into a ball of flame and the legs finally crumble. I'm reloading the Quad Rocket and I see the cockpit attempt to open but only flames leap out. I'm glad I don't have to hear the screams this time. But with all the death I had seen, I couldn't remember the last time a scream really registered to my ears. Sure I heard those shrill blasts, I could even imagine the pilot inside screaming as his lungs turned to ash, but feelings of angst or uncomfortableness was alien to me now.
I had seen so much suffering that I guess I didn't take suffering seriously anymore. (The Monstrumologist, Rick Yancey)
"Boss." Sid shows the general direction of an incoming homing missile. "A pilot is locking on. Neutralize him or get to cover."
"We got cover Sid, don't sweat." I turned my titan towards the Archer rocket launcher locked onto me and I see the heavy missile coming right for me. It has a long, orange tail of smoke as it zips through the air. If I did not pull up the vortex shield with the left hand of my titan, that missile may have gone clear through my lightly armored cockpit. I would have been riding that rocket until it slammed into the mountainside. Instead, I saw the incapacitated rocket floating in the vortex's circular shield. The blue strength is of the shield waned from orange to red and I could not find the offending pilot so I sent the large rocket into a group of Militia grunts. All I saw after that was a big plume of snow.
The Militia Atlas had destroyed the automated IMC Ogre that had the plasma railgun. I saw it reloading a Triple Threat grenade launcher as it targeted the other Ogre that assisted me with the X0-16 Chain gun
The female Betty OS voice calls to me from the empty cockpit of the Ogre. "I am engaging an enemy titan—requesting assistance."
"Just kill it and quit playing with it." Sid said. I almost let out a laugh. I don't regret the couple thousand credits I spent to have the programmer make Sid cranky all the time.
The Ogre with the Betty voice inside succumbed to a barrage of Triple Threat grenades and collapsed. These Milita pilots must feel pretty good about themselves when they take down a couple of titans that quickly. The only asterisk on their stupendous success for the greater good of the Frontier is that for every automated titan they kill, we already have two more being built. If an IMC Pilot happened to be inside, that titan went from being a harmless whale, all gigantic and docile, to the cruelest tiger shark strapped with rockets. Now this Milita Atlas was about to have a taste of some real war, and this tiger shark was already loving the smell of blood on the snow.
The Andromeda Relay program in the previous Ogre Titans did enough damage to shut down the shields on my opponent. The Atlas was not to be taken for granted though. The Atlas was a tough machine with still a good amount of speed and maneuverability. The Triple Threat also declared it as one of the best close combat weapons, which the Quad Rocket tried to boast that it was best at close quarters as well. This was going to be a deadly dance.
The Milita Pilot detected me rushing in and swung the Triple Threat towards me. It fired three grenades in a horizontal plane at my titan. The magnets on the grenades would suck the explosive in and detonate against my shields. I had hoped he would try fire the grenade launcher vertically to try and exact the most damage on me but he wanted to keep me from flanking him. I unleashed a rocket salvo but my running titan made the rockets inaccurate and spray all over the place. One of its grenade blew up on the my Stryder's legs and my shields went down significantly. One of the most difficult aspects of being a Stryder pilot is not panicking. Heck, a cotton-ball hitting a Styder could knock down the shields and cause severe damage. Yet, "the trick, Potter, is not minding that it hurts." (Prometheus/Lawrence of Arabia).
I got very close, so close I could almost see the insignias on the Militia Atlas. I did not fire the Quad Rocket because it would blow me to smithereens and the Atlas has enough armor to still be standing. That is when I saw what I wanted to see. The Atlas could not resist the temptation to lay into the annoying, dash happy Stryder and I saw the giant machine reach back a metal fist. I dashed the empty side and escaped a killer blow. I spun my Stryder around and fired eight rockets into the back of the Atlas. The machine fell to its knees but not quite out yet. I dashed back and pulled back my metal fist to finish this mortal combat. That is when I saw a flash of blue light emitting from the shattered hull of the Militia Atlas Titan. The nuclear reactor was going critical and it straightened up like a patient on a vertical stretcher to eject the Militia Pilot. I pressed the dash to go backwards and only heard a faulty beep.
Oh Shit!
I turned the Styder around and sprinted as hard as that machine could push. The nuclear reaction was reaching its crescendo of its deadly whine and I was only halfway out of the killzone. Once more to save my life, the quick dash charger indicated I had one more boost. I dashed but the fires of the semi-nuclear explosion clawed at the back of the Stryder like a hungry beast.
"Shields down, Boss—critical damage, seek cov—" Sid said and I had one second to decide. Abandon the ship! Women and children second!
My hands left the controls as the heat of the blast enveloped my titan. Shrapnel holes tore through the cockpit and sparks flew into my face from the display consoles. Every electrical device was spitting hateful sparks and screaming red when I reached between my legs and yanked the ejection hammer as hard as my muscles could pull. The nuclear blast was throwing my Stryder down to hell in a forward angle so I did not eject straight up but in the angle of an artillery shell.
The cold wind whistled by helmet as I flew over the white world. I looked back and my Stryder was a smoldering heap. At least the IMC had two more ready for me. But would I make it back to those two? The cockpit seat left my rear end and fell away into oblivion. I had nothing to stable me in the air as I began to crash towards the earth. I tumbled through the air and risked the chance of breaking every bone in my mortal body. I fired my jump kit and it helped stabilize my equilibrium as my body picked up speed towards the snow. Hopefully it would be powder.
My feet hit the snow unnaturally hard. I tucked and rolled into the snow bank. The jump kit had lessened my fall quite a bit but I still felt instantly sore. I laid in the snow for a moment. Before me was the crushed snow of my body's artillery barrage and in the distance was the smoke of a titan battle. Funny thing was, that all lasted probably fifteen minutes, max. I checked my watch, sure enough, twenty one minutes since I called Sid planet side.
"Constructing another Stryder Titan for you," Sid said. Sid's A.I. was synched with the main IMC network and intrinsically tied to my suit. Even when I died, Sid would live on in archives. Would it miss me? Would it spend time trying not to miss me, like I do for Alice?
The snow was really coming down now. It was actually a storm swirling in the pale valley. Except the thunderous booms were more titans entering the atmosphere to continue the endless battle for the sake of battle. Keeping the strong, strong, and the weak taking a fist in their teeth.
Sid said into my comm, "your titan will be ready in three minutes." So in other words, an eternity? I thought. I simply laid there for a moment in the snow and flipped open my helmet visor. The snowflakes were angel kisses on my sweat-hot face. My breath was vapor and nothing was sweeter because I could have been incinerated a few seconds ago.
I sat up and laid the G2A4 Rifle across my lap. I glanced once more at the ten notch marks in the wooden stock. Before me, the sounds of more IMC titans clashed with the Militia forces. Fighter jets weaved in and out of the snowing clouds. Dropships were breaking the atmosphere and flying into the smoke of our first battles.
I missed Alice terribly. I wished she hadn't died. I loaded a bullet into the chamber and ran back into the fray.