Mecha Rogue (10 page)

Colonel Cruz's voice boomed in Matt's ear: “Major, status report!”

“Completing my mission, sir,” Matt told him.

“Don't lie to me! We've been monitoring your status!”

“And you still want me to kill them all, sir?”

“Yes. Proceed!”

Matt sighed. His future, elusive as it had been, went up in flames. He simply couldn't do it.

I'm not a tool,
Matt thought.
I'm a person.

And for once, it was time to make a good choice.

“No,” Matt told Cruz.

“Are you refusing a direct order?”

“Yes, sir. I'm afraid I am, sir.”

Cruz's voice snapped off his private comms with a clipped curse. His comms icon immediately popped back up on the
COL. CRUZ
TEAM
channel.

“This is Colonel James Cruz,” his voice boomed. “New orders. I am removing Major Lowell from command. Disregard any further orders from him. Mr. Lowell, return to the
Helios
immediately.”

A short pause. “Full team, proceed with orders to eliminate all life-forms at objective.”

6

ROGUE

“Step aside,” Norah said, aiming her MK-160 straight at Matt's visor.

Behind her, the air-lock door framed an icy world sliding toward night, with long shadows casting the fissure into deep dusk.

In that moment, Matt felt everything as if outside himself. The desperate HuMax lab subjects behind him, fighting to protect the last thing they had. Norah in front of him, sighting down the barrel of the MK-160 and a posture of grim purpose. Xie standing next to her, looking around uncertainly, his rifle still pointed at the floor.

Matt sighed. He could go back to the UUS
Helios
and face the Union. Given the deep-cover nature of the mission, there would certainly be a court-martial—and he'd lose every chance to get the answers he sought.

But that's the only choice,
Matt thought. What else could he do? Try to convince his team to stand down, after being given a direct order from Colonel Cruz?

Or fight next to the HuMax rebels? That was even crazier. Why would he fight to protect the race that murdered his father? The race that almost brought about the end of all humanity?

Matt turned to look behind him. The HuMax rebels had stopped firing. They could tell that when one giant robot was holding a gun on the other, something significant was happening. They watched the three Mecha with wide violet-and-yellow eyes, even as many of them died from exposure in their leaking, jerry-rigged space suits.

Kill them,
a voice rasped again, like static in Matt's mind.
Make your space. Rule them all.

“Move.” Norah's voice rasped through the comms as she motioned with her MK-160.

“What are we going to do now?”
Michelle had asked him, a million years ago.

“Save the universe,”
Matt had told her.
“From whatever it needs saving from
.
”

Even the Union,
the voice rasped. And in that moment, it made sense. Even though Matt knew the pain and insanity that gibbered behind it.

Matt holstered his own MK-160 and held up his hands, as if surrendering. He stepped away from the HuMax and headed for the air lock. His footfalls echoed like rifle cracks in the thin atmosphere.

Norah swiveled her gun to point at the HuMax. Xie still pointed his at the floor.

At the air lock, Matt plunged his talons into the control panel again and reached out to grab Norah's Demon's shoulder. His Demon's arm elongated to close the gap between the two Mecha as Xie recoiled in surprise. His claws dug deep into Norah's shoulder. Her angry, panicked thoughts flooded into him as she yelled in surprise over the comms.

What are you doing! Not in my mind again! No! Stop!

Matt pulled Norah back toward his Mecha, bowling her off her feet. He dragged her into Xie's Demon and heard the sob of his thoughts. Once all three Demons were in contact with each other, Matt thought,
Merge.

No! No! Can't Merge!
Norah screamed.

Why?
Xie asked.

Matt's talons flowed into Norah's shoulder as Xie's tangled arms melted into the other two Mecha. Their thoughts beat at him, panicky and confused.

Stop Merge and hold,
Matt thought. Their transition slowed and ceased. The Merge slowly began to reverse. Matt struggled to keep it stable, but he could only slow the process. They'd soon deMerge, and he'd lose control over Norah and Xie. He'd have to be quick.

First things first, though. Matt cycled the outer air lock shut and began pressurizing the dock. The atmospheric readouts climbed toward green, as the HuMax's makeshift space suits slowly stopped outgassing.

Let me show you,
Matt told Norah and Xie, channeling the summary of the Union's HuMax research project to the two other pilots.

At the same time, he opened the air lock's inner doors so they could see the interior of the Union research installation.

It looked like videos of old-time prisons, pre-Expansion stuff from Earth. Floor-to-ceiling rows of cells flanked either side of a sterile plaza. Utilitarian walkways passed by every cell. There were no bars, but large, clear windows ensured that the cell's occupants had no privacy. Some were heavily scarred. Others were pristine. Overtop all, the ribbed translucent ceiling glowed faintly purple in the dying daylight, casting a pallid glow over the entire scene. From some of the cells, yellow-and-violet eyes looked down on the air lock, quivering in terror.

You see?
Matt asked the other two pilots.
You see what they've been doing?

It's horrible,
Xie thought, his mind sending overtones of revulsion and panic. He was genemod himself. Was this where his enhancements came from? If so, how was he truly any different than these people here?

We have orders,
Norah thought, her mind clamped desperately around a grim idolization of the Union.
There are other reasons. We don't know everything.

That's what I thought,
Matt told her.

I am nothing like you!
Norah screamed in her mind, suddenly pushing him away. Matt's talons came out of her shoulder. She was now connected to him only through Xie. Matt was losing control.

Norah,
Matt thought.
Just look
—

Depleted-uranium slugs stitched across Matt's torso, needle pricks of pain. Matt looked up. Inside the Union installation, in the broad plaza, stood two Imp Mecha, carrying old-style MK-14 rifles.

Matt frowned in grim memory. Through his childhood, his most prized possession had been an Imp Mecha model. He used to hold it at night as his refugee ship dropped off to sleep, and dream of using an Imp to wipe out the man who killed his father. His first exercise in Mecha Training Camp had been against an augmented Imp. It seemed he couldn't escape them.

Compared to the Demons, the Imps were tiny, primitive things, titanium space frames and aerogel armor, with tiny slits of duraplas for the pilot to peer through. Purely mechanical technology, with a weak fusion core. They were still used widely in industry and on frontier worlds because of their durability, but they were no match for a Hellion, much less a Demon. This was just the last-ditch effort by the HuMax to protect their home.

We're taking fire!
Norah screamed in his mind, her brain twisting and bucking like an animal aflame.

Before Matt could react, she threw off the last vestiges of his Merge and scrambled to her feet, drawing her MK-160 in one smooth motion. She charged into the hail of depleted-uranium fire, her head down.

“Stop!” Matt shouted.

Norah brought up her giant rifle and pressed the trigger. Muzzle flashes strobed the plaza. One of the Imps rocked back in the impact of the fifty-millimeter slugs, spraying titanium and aerogel armor shards. The other reversed course and scrambled back toward the rear corridor it had emerged from. Norah charged forward and pumped more slugs into the first Imp. In the enclosed space, the reverberation of her gun was immense, like thunder. The fallen Imp quivered and lay still.

Matt tried to go after her, but he was still Merged with the control panel.
DeMerge!
he thought desperately. His hand emerged from the metal, but the process seemed immensely, painfully slow. Xie still cowered where he'd fallen, his Demon trembling in confusion.

“I'm out,” Xie mumbled over the comms. “I'm out of this. Leave me out of all this. Please.”

As Matt came free of the control panel, the second Imp entered the tunnel, turned, and launched a half dozen old-style Streaker antipersonnel missiles. They hissed at Norah's Demon. She ran straight at them, never faltering. She batted away two aimed at her visor in great greasy fireballs. The rest impacted and exploded on her Demon with no effect. She ran trailing flame, her MK-160 thundering destruction. Depleted-uranium slugs annihilated the door frame where the Imp had launched its missiles. But the Imp itself was long gone, down a tunnel of ice. Norah slammed into the tunnel entrance and thrashed at it in anger. Her Demon was too big to fit into the three-meter-tall tunnel.

Matt launched himself at her. He had no idea what he'd do when he reached her Demon, or what the future held. He only knew he had to protect these innocent people. The rest would follow.

Norah whirled to aim at him. Matt tucked away his MK-160 and withdrew his Zap Gun. Norah scrambled to match him as he tore across the plaza.

Could he shoot precisely enough with the Zap Gun to disable her Demon? Without killing her? Without taking the whole facility out? Matt clamped his teeth together grimly and aimed.

A bright flash from overhead blinded Matt as a thunderous
crack
reverberated through the facility. Instinctively he ducked and rolled, bringing his Zap Gun up toward the source of the light. A brief hurricane plucked at his giant Mecha, whistling past his ears.

Two red Demons, riding pillars of antimatter thrust, descended through a gaping hole in the ceiling of the Union research lab. One carried a third Demon around the waist. Behind the Mecha, stars had begun to glitter in the deepening dusk.

Around them, the contents of the facility fountained out as the atmosphere blasted out of the roof. HuMax in makeshift space suits were sucked off their feet and flung into the deadly-thin atmosphere of the frozen world. Others gasped and thrashed on the floor, trying to breathe. Air streamed out of two hundred closed cells, screaming like claws on glass in the thin atmosphere. Some of the cells had been barricaded with sealant. Most hadn't.

Marjan, Mikey, and Elize had arrived.

* * *

Marjan came at Matt like an arrow. A giant red arrow, a demigod of hell. For long moments, Matt could do nothing but think,
It's all over
as the HuMax writhed and died in the tenuous atmosphere outside. He was only dimly aware of Norah and Mikey, aiming their Zap Guns at the opposite blocks of cells.

Marjan slammed into Matt. His cockpit rang like a bell, and Matt's Demon hit the plaza floor hard, banging his visor against the steel decking. In that moment of contact, he felt everything: Marjan's dark thoughts of rending and tearing Matt's Demon to bits, his murderous hate for the show-off who'd shamed him in the Mecha, his satisfaction with Colonel Cruz's orders to ensure the complete destruction of the hidden Union installation and everything inside it.

Marjan swiped at Matt's Demon's visor with his claws. Matt brought an arm up, blocking him at the last moment. Marjan's Demon's hand glowed with blue-white fusion power as he struggled to find a grip for his Fusion Handshake. If Matt let him lock on, he might be done for.

Dazzling light filled the chamber as Norah and Mikey unloaded with their Zap Guns. Cells vaporized on either side of the two struggling Demons, showering them with red-hot spatters of molten aluminum. Walkways flashed yellow-hot and crumpled into a tangle of twisted metal. Matt imagined he could hear short, high-pitched screams as the HuMax were wiped out, one by one.

“No!” Matt screamed, and bucked Marjan off him. He fired thrusters and went full-force at Norah. The reflection of the incandescent Zap Gun beam in her visor cast a jagged highlight along its mirror surface, as if she were smiling.

Matt hit Norah before she could react. Her Zap Gun fire went wild, slicing through the remaining cells. Metal girders and duraplas sheets collapsed and pelted the Mecha with razor-edged debris. Matt batted it away as he dug into Norah. She struggled to bring her Zap Gun around and aim it at him.

Behind them, Mikey continued the wholesale annihilation of the opposite cells. His job was almost complete; the entire north side of the complex slumped in on itself, ready to crumple. Deep blue ice showed through holes in the structure. Where the Zap Gun touched the ice, it billowed clouds of white steam, which instantly froze into snow and fell inside the complex.

Norah's thoughts were a reflection of Mikey's and Marjan's. She was enjoying this. She would enjoy it even more if Matt toppled with the Union installation. To her, he was the one thing holding her back. She had faith in the Union and its orders.

Matt shoved her Zap Gun away as it sputtered to life again. It shot upward through the remaining cells, slicing through the metal like butter. The cell block collapsed outward, crashing to rest on the ravine outside. The rest of the roof slammed down around them. The few remaining HuMax in their jerry-rigged space suits disappeared under the debris.

Matt screamed silently.
Dead. All dead.
He couldn't help them. He'd completely failed.

Marjan hit him again, wrapping his hand around Matt's head. For a moment, Matt's POV was completely filled by the glowing blue Fusion Handshake port. He could count the ribs in its dispersion modifier, and he saw the power cycling up to firing potential.

I could let it end here,
Matt thought.
What place do I have in a Union that condones operations like this? In a Union that, in some ways, might be worse than the Corsairs?

Save the universe. However we can.

Red-hot anger surged through Matt. He couldn't just let it go. He had to keep trying. And there was only one way he could stop Marjan now.

Merge,
he thought.

For an instant, the three Mecha melded together. Matt felt Norah's familiar panic, but she couldn't stop the process. Matt was too strong.

No,
Marjan thought. And he pulled away
.

Marjan's Demon's hand emerged from the beginning Merge. Then his leg. Marjan's Demon struggled against the mass, and pulled itself almost completely free.

Matt reeled in shock. How could Marjan resist the Merge?

Gloating satisfaction came in waves from the other man.
I've been practicing,
he thought.
You're no longer the master.

Marjan's Demon thrust its talons into the proto-Merge of Matt and Norah's Demons. It tore through Matt's biomechanical flesh like a knife. Matt screamed inside his viewmask.