Son of Sedonia

12

Courage


“JESUS CHRIST, KID, could you try to jerk my f*cking shrap-torn leg any more? I don’t think it’s cut deep enough, so why don’t you just go ahead and punch the wound while you’re at it!” Shima clutched the collar of Vaughn’s flak jacket. The rookie worked to remove the mangled Augmentor shin-plate. Charred chunks of sheet metal peppered both of Shima’s armored legs, some making it through to flesh. Someone had tossed a popper-bomb into their shelter. Not enough to kill, but just enough to maim. It had been quiet since then.

“He ain’t ever field dressed a wound before, Shims, let me take a look,” said Mason.

“No! Stay on those windows! I want your eyes on the roofline, not some Red Gate—AAH!” The shin-plate popped free. Several blistered cuts and punctures covered the skin underneath. Vaughn set the shin-plate aside and grabbed the forceps from the med kit. One by one, he removed the remaining bits of shrapnel...some deeper than others. One was in at least four centimeters. Shima unsheathed his field knife, making Vaughn jump, but flipped it around and stuck the rubber grip in his teeth. Bit down as the forceps went in and grabbed the hot razor-sharp metal. Vaughn slid it out with little extra cutting.

“That’s the last one,” Vaughn said, reaching for the antiseptic spray, bandage and gauze. He sprayed the length of Shima’s calf and shin, pressed on the bandage seals, and wrapped it.

“Not bad for a first try, kid,” Mason said.

“Yeah, it’s fantastic, now get your weapon and take a window,” Shima barked as he pushed up on his good leg. Vaughn looked out his side. The long range thermal data had cut out shortly after the explosion, so they were down to personal optics. IR mode in their Neurals turned night into a cloudy day, but shadows moved everywhere. The blank, black windows seemed to watch them in their sad excuse for a shelter.

It was a half-finished addition to the rooftop of a shop building. Four brick walls rose in varying heights to form a small room. The windows were open gaps with barely enough wall to stand covered on either side. Vaughn crouched beside one. Slice the pie. Be a smaller target. He stilled himself as he backed away from the window and pointed his SMG’s iron sights along the edge. Slowly swept right. Nothing appeared in the crosshairs. Only the patchy, gray faces of chaotic buildings, silent in their stacks. Flashes and the distant report of gunshots advertised the battle raging all over the Slums. Jesus, what the hell did we start? He lowered his weapon an inch.

A white-hot shape bobbed into view then disappeared.

“Movement! I’ve got movement!” Vaughn rasped, choking the foregrip on his submachine gun.

“Great! Where? Call out the f*cking location!” Shima hissed. Again, he pushed himself up on his good leg and peeked over the window ledge.

“Yeah—!—uh—it was Eas—er—North at my two o’clock...I think, sir.”

“You think?”

“I’m pretty sure, sir. It was there, then it was gone again, sir.”

“Jesus...” Shima sank back into cover and pressed his throat node. “Theta Squad to HQ: What the hell is the ETA on my evac?! I’ve had my beacon blinking its ass off for over five f*cking minutes!”

“Be advised, Theta, all friendly aircraft are either currently engaged or flying home to re-arm. A gunship will be dispatched to your location as soon as I’ve got one for you,” the voice hummed in each of their ear implants.

“All of them? The whole fleet?!” Vaughn’s voice lifted a little louder than it should. Mason hissed and patted the air with a hand. The rookie groaned and leaned up to scan the roofline again.

“Over half my squad is KIA, I’m wounded and immobile, we’re stuck in darkest Rasalla with hostiles closing, and you’re telling me there’s not one goddamn ship?!” Shima looked like his face would explode.

“Affirmative, Theta. Recommend you dig in, and stay quiet, we are coming.”

Shima clenched his fists and almost punched the wall. He ripped his ammo pouch open, took out a live ammo mag, and dropped the active spur mag out of his SMG.Loaded the rounds.

“Sir? I thought we only had clearance for non-lethal.” Vaughn said. Shima took out a flash suppressor and screwed it onto the barrel.

“T99s don’t give a damn about spurs, but they respect bullets. If we’ve got any hope of holding ‘em back long enough we’ve gotta hurt ’em,” said Shima.

Mason and Vaughn changed their magazines. Vaughn finished screwing on his suppressor and looked back through the window. Just in time to be blinded by a flash between two buildings. He cringed and spun back into cover as nearby whoops and shouts broke the silence. Vaughn’s eyes cleared in time to see smoking red lights arcing through the sky, over their wall, and landing in the middle of the shelter floor.

“Flares!” Shima yelled as he lunged toward them, putting weight on his bandaged shin. He landed directly on the wound, yelled, then grabbed at the flares. Threw two of them out. Three more fell in. Then two more. They heaped in a glowing pile as the first shots zipped through the walls.

“SHIT! Fire at will!” Shima screamed. The body heat signals poured out of the twilit slumscape. Vaughn couldn’t hope to prioritize targets. The muzzle flashes looked like the grandstands of the Sedonia Civic Arena during the half-time show. As the brick and concrete flew apart around him, Vaughn shrank into cover, clutching his weapon. He couldn’t think, let alone move.

“Wake the f*ck up, kid! Kill or be killed!” Mason’s voice came through low and deep in Vaughn’s implant radio. Vaughn looked to the veteran EXO as the man squeezed a few three-round bursts out of the weapon, each at a specific target. Shima did the same on the opposite wall, blood pouring down his leg as he stood on it to get position.

Flip the switch, flip the switch, flip the switch. Vaughn hit himself in the helmet. His legs wouldn’t budge. Concrete exploded everywhere, making their cover look more like coral. He clamped his eyes shut. Felt his heartbeat in his throat. All sound around him turned to white noise. Then something opened his eyes.

He found himself staring into the burning phosphorous light of the flares. Time slowed. In the space he felt his heart and his breath. His hands and his feet. His arms and his legs. Fear was still there, but it seemed more like another appendage. Something else to work with. The order eclipsed it: Kill or be killed. Gritting his teeth, he leaned out of cover and pumped half a mag into the growing mob.

Matteo sprinted across the rooftops toward the flashes ahead. He jumped over alleys, raced up and down stairs, and swung onto catwalks, movements he’d seen Jogun do a hundred times. Yet now on the way to his own battle, it felt different than he’d fantasized. Part hunter and part hunted. Righteous and terrified. Distant thoughts screamed faintly to calm down and turn back. The drive to listen gripped his chest. No home to run to.

The half-finished shed on the roof of Daigi’s shop glowed blinding red from the inside. Dark silhouettes peeked out of the windows then darted out of sight, each time followed by a pounding hail of T99 bullets. A hazy bloodshot cloud surrounded the building. Through it, Matteo saw the dwellers climbing up the fire escape. It wouldn’t be long now.

The first building to his right had a balcony on the top floor where a few T99s took cover. This close, he could see the sparks and chunks of shrapnel burst from the surrounding buildings. Bullets, not spurs. He crouched low behind a rooftop wall, and waited. The shape of an EXO leaned out from behind his cover and fired at the balcony. The T99s ducked. Some sprayed blind shots over the railing. The shooting stopped a second.

Matteo took his chance. Three huge strides and he pushed off on the fourth, flying down toward the balcony. He grabbed the awning and swung inside, kicking one or two gangsters in the process. They shoved him off and into the corner. His gun skittered across the floor somewhere.

“The f*ck you think you doin’, man?!” a voice screamed. Matteo pawed around in the dark for the pistol.

“Left window! Shoot the bitch!” another one shouted. Gunfire erupted. Matteo crumpled into a ball and clapped his hands over his ears. The noise. It felt like the shots were going off inside his skull. The sour smell of gunpowder choked him first, then someone’s hand did it for real. Slammed him against the floor.

“I should kill you too!” The wild stare on Oki’s face was like nothing Matteo had ever seen. A rabid Pit dog ready to rip your throat out with a crooked grin.

“Oki, chill!” Suomo shouted above the gunfire and nearby screams. The T99 Boss crouched at the open end of the balcony, leaning out to fire a burst from his brand new EXO submachine gun. Oki released the choke hold, dropping Matteo gasping to the ground. Matteo felt something shoved into his chest.

“Drop this again and I f*ckin’ blast you!” Oki said. Matteo fumbled at the pistol grip then took hold. Another burst from the EXOs made everyone duck again...except one of the younger Nines. The boy took a round full in the face, making a canoe out of his head. Thick wet droplets landed on Matteo’s arm. The shooting stopped and something dragged him up by the hood. He choked himself on the hoodie collar as he tried to stay down.

“Shoot, goddammit!” Oki’s voice cracked as he screamed. Matteo cringed at the gunfire pounding his eardrums. Oki slapped him in the face.

“SHOOT!”

A flash of rage set Matteo’s mind on fire. He flexed his fingers around the grip as his heartbeat jackhammered over the muffled pops of pistols, rifles, and SMGs. The blood. It pooled on the ground by the T99 boy’s shattered head. Raia’s face appeared to him. Staring. His body trembled as he wrestled with the will to do something. Anything. The wheezing tickle in the back of his throat turned every breath into a saw blade as his knees started to buckle.

Suddenly he was lying back on that rooftop six years ago. Helpless as he watched Jogun shudder and twist with every punch, kick, knee, and elbow. For years he had dreamed of the ways he could have hurt them, should have hurt them. The thousands of things that would have saved his family. His grip on the pistol tightened. Inhale-exhale-inhale-exhale-INHALE. He whipped the gun up, pointed it at the glowing building. The EXOs inside moved in flickering blurs.

Matteo fired a shot and all but dropped the gun as it kicked. The sensation sent needles down his spine. He brought up his left hand to steady his aim. Two more shots. The rounds blasted dusty chunks out of the brick wall.

“That’s RIGHT!” Oki slapped his back so hard it gave him a funny taste in his mouth. The others looked over at him too, all smiles. Matteo managed an insane laugh. Movement in the right window caught his eye. A pulsing shadow that seemed to turn toward him. With a sharp breath, he focused on the shape, looked down the sight, steadied the weapon, and squeezed the trigger. Since he was ready for it, the shot felt more like a little pop The shadow jerked and fell out of view.

Cheers picked up all around him. Oki grabbed him by the shoulders and shook. He tried to smile at them, but his mind struggled with the new data. I got one. I killed an EXO. A hail of bullets sprayed into the balcony and everyone got down. Matteo dropped with a limp thud. The sudden rush made him dizzy. He pressed himself as low as he could as dust and debris rained down from the balcony wall. It stopped. The others got up.

“One down, two to kill!” Suomo said from somewhere close-by, “Rasalla!”

“RASALLA!” the T99s shouted as they opened fire.

Between three-round bursts through his iron sights, Vaughn saw a broad, heavy shape slump and fall out of his peripheral vision. A red distress icon appeared in his Neural beside the name. ‘Mason.’ He ducked into cover and turned to see the old vet clutching his left shoulder joint, struggling through wet gasps for air. The man seemed more pissed off than anything.

“Sergeant!” Vaughn screamed, lunging toward the wounded vet.

“Get the f*ck back on that window!” Shima shouted as he continued to pump controlled bursts from his side of the shelter. Before Vaughn could protest, Mason planted a boot in his flak jacket and shoved him backward. Vaughn heard the sounds outside getting louder. Closer. He peeked back over his cover to see T99s crawling up the side of the building. Reflex spun his rifle up to drill the closest of the group. They tumbled backwards, knocking a few of the others off. Wild shots cracked in the air as they whizzed past close enough to graze Vaughn’s helmet and visor.

“Theta Squad, this is Odin Six Four. Request sit-rep, over,” said a calm voice in his inner ear. Shima stabbed two fingers into his throat mic and shouted.

“I’m wounded, we’ve got a man down, and about ten-thousand f*cking angry locals closing! We need every goddamn thing you can give us NOW!” The pause that followed made all the screaming hell of the fight seem quiet. Vaughn dropped five more climbing bodies in the time it took for the reply to come.

“Roger Theta, Odin Six Four en route to your RFID signals for Purge and evac. ETA: 1:30 minutes.” The relief washed through Vaughn to the point of feeling faint. He tensed and shoved the rifle butt deeper into his shoulder. Pick your target. Fire. Pick the next target. Fire. The Red Gate combat mantra returned to him as intended, but the other word the pilot had used tugged at the back of his mind.

Purge. Hope and dread came in equal parts where one of those was concerned. The new gunships were outfitted with BASE platforms. Broad Area Stun Emitters. The half-sphere shaped delivery mechanism would extend from the underbelly of the gunship, charge in a matter of seconds, then send a one hundred-foot diameter sonic blast. They’d done it to him in basic. After the initial full-body slap, it had felt like his spine turned to cotton. Every muscle fiber simultaneously lost tension and then it was lights out. A two-hour coma followed. Then the sum total of every hangover he’d ever had.

The Aug gear would dampen the shock of this one, but the thought of anything like that sensation shivered down his backbone...and there was still a chance of being knocked out. Long enough for T99 reinforcements to arrive. Naked in the hornets’ nest. He glanced at the ETA displayed in the upper middle part of his vision. 1:14. He had shot or killed six men since the pilot’s broadcast. Eight took their place.

The noise in their shelter suddenly dropped down a layer. Enough to make them both pause and glance. Mason lay toppled on his side, weapon resting in an expanding pool of flickering blood.

“Mason! Not now, goddammit, it’s time to work! MASON!” Shima screamed. The old vet didn’t move.

“Reloading! Last mag!” Vaughn threw the spent one aside and somehow stilled the shaking enough to click the new one in place. He squeezed off two bursts before he heard it. A hundred or more voices chanting at once. Each word a hate-filled bark.

“Ra-sa-lla, Ra-sa-lla, we-fight-for-our-home! From-scrap-and-from-ashes-and-dirt-we-are-grown! T-ninety-nine-soldiers, our-blood-for-our-own! DIE-EXO-DIE-EXO-in-pain-all-alone!”

Matteo felt the words flow like molten metal in his veins. The fear receded, replaced with something else. All around him, the T99s shouted in one voice. Oki spat the chant, firing bursts in time with the lyrics. Suomo stopped firing to howl it in all directions. The voices lifted high above the gunfire. One full repetition later, ’Matteo had memorized the words.

“Ra-sa-lla, Ra-sa-lla, we-fight-for-our-home! From-scrap-and-from-ashes-and-dirt-we-are-grown! T-nine-ty-nine-soldiers, our-blood-for-our-own! DIE-EXO-DIE-EXO-in-pain-all-alone!”

This was new. Hate, fear, grief, and joy all focused into one feeling that came roaring out of his gut. He yanked himself to his feet and fired five rounds before the slide cocked back. Empty. A slap hit him in the chest. Oki’s hand pinned a fresh pistol mag to it. Matteo could hardly believe this was the same guy.

“T-nine-ty-nine-soldiers, our-blood-for-our-own!” Oki pushed his face close to Matteo’s as he yelled. Matteo took the mag. Wide eyed and smiling, he rejoined the chant as he fumbled with the weapon.

“DIE-EXO-DIE-EXO—!” The roar of hover-engines drowned them out and panic ripped through the crowd. Some, mostly T99s, leaned out and fired at the gunship. Others turned and ran for low ground, scrambling down ramps and stairwells, or climbing down wall ledges. A few jumped. Matteo tried. He pulled himself up onto the side railing and looked for a place to land in the alley below. The ship was on top of them, the air thick with a deafening hum and the smell of ozone. That pile of tin. I’ll get cut, but it’ll break the fall. As he lunged, Oki grabbed his hood and yanked him back into the balcony. Dazed, Matteo watched Oki’s pinched face contort as he soundlessly screamed something. Matteo couldn’t tell what. From his place on the balcony floor, he saw a shiny dome of metal come out of a belly panel on the gunship. Bullets plinked off of it as it started to glow...and shake. It shook so hard and fast that it blurred into a shape twice as big.

The hum gathered into a high pitched squeal over crushing vibration. Oki released Matteo as both of them pressed palms over their ears. Matteo felt like he was screaming. Couldn’t be sure. It all suddenly paused in a moment of charged silence. Time enough to look up and then—

BOOOOOOOOOooooooommmm. A pale blue wave of light burst from under the gunship, spreading instantly over the entire block. The shock of it threw Matteo back into the wall, buckling the flimsy metal. His vision flashed stark white. Then black.