Opus X

Chapter 5

February 25, 2231, Iceland, South of Vatnajökull Glacier

February 25, 2231, Iceland, South of Vatnajökull GlacierFlurries of ice and snow streamed down outside the cargo flitter, visible through the windows and Emma’s camera feeds. The visual feeds relayed to the four exoskeletons inside, which were piloted by Erik, Jia, Kant, and Anne.

The vehicle lurched violently, dropping several meters before leveling out.

“Try not to kill us before we get there, Emma,” Erik complained. “I feel like I’m in a drop pod taking AAA.”

He was grateful he was already strapped into his exo. Trying to load up when their ride kept shaking or abruptly changing altitude would have ended with him being knocked out.

Helmets could only do so much, and he’d rather not deal with a raging headache while trying to kill whatever crazy bastards were waiting inside the Core compound they were about to raid.

“Oh, I see,” Emma replied in a snotty tone. “You would have effortlessly flown through a blizzard without crashing while simultaneously trying to maintain a low altitude to reduce the risk of detection.” She sniffed over the speaker. “Would you rather fly?”

“Just saying, I finally got Alina to give us our own cargo flitter,” Erik muttered. “She gave me a bunch of crap about it.”

“Don’t want to trash it on our first mission with it,” Kant interjected, sounding jolly. “But you’re the mission leader, brother. If we go down, it’s ultimately your fault.” He chuckled. “Don’t blame the pilot!”

“Gee, thanks,” Erik replied with a grunt. “True enough.” He rolled his shoulders, pushing against his harness. “We could have used this for that little incident in Russia, but at least you and Anne were able to join us for that. You got to skip the fun on New Samarkand.”

“Hey,” Kant argued, “we got shot. It’s not like we planned it. Why are you still going on about it?”

planned“Excuses, excuses.” Erik grinned. “And what are you bitching about? It wasn’t that long ago I got my arm blown off, and I was back in the saddle after a little fix. Jia’s the one who was worried.”

“I think you were being an i***t,” Jia interjected.

Anne let out an annoyed grunt. “Shouldn’t we keep our focus?”

“Why?” Kant asked. “Emma’s the one flying, and if we go down, there’s nothing we’re going to be able to do about it. We’ll be trudging through a blizzard in exos in enemy territory, and if they didn’t notice us before, they’ll notice when we crash. After that, it’s just about shooting people.”

“Why don’t we skip the part where we go down?” Jia suggested.

Emma snickered. “I should point out that if we crash, I’m at risk too. Assuming I survive, I’d be one object a little bigger than a data rod in the middle of nowhere in Iceland. I imagine I’d end up buried under meters and meters of ice and snow.”

“Someone can dig you up in the future,” Kant suggested. “Archaeologists will study the ancient twenty-third century culture and wonder about the mysterious Holy Rod of Iceland.”

“It’s a big assumption that Earth will still be around in the future,” Anne muttered.

“Always looking on the bright side,” Kant replied.

Anne eyed him. “Being realistic is always better than ignoring unpleasant possibilities.”

alwaysThe flitter rolled a good forty-five degrees before Emma leveled it out. Erik wasn’t sure if that was the result of a crosswind or a fit of pique. The rapid dive and climb that followed convinced his stomach it didn’t care either way.

At this point, he would have preferred the drop pod.

Kant let out a yelp of excitement. “WOOO! It’s been a while since I charged through a storm like this.”

“’Fun’ isn’t the word I would have used,” Anne replied.

Jia grimaced. “I’m just glad I’m not the one flying.”

“Of course you are,” Emma commented.

Erik glanced at the altimeter marker that was being streamed to his faceplate. That last drop had had them practically scraping the ground. He had to give the AI credit. Even a pilot as talented as Jia might have had them painting the snow with the bottom of the flitter.

“We’ll plan on surviving until we get to the target site. If I’m going to die, I’d rather it be because of my own mistake.” Erik nodded at the decreasing distance to target. Whatever someone might say about flying through a heavy blizzard at night, it did provide natural cover for a raid. He’d been dubious when Alina suggested timing the raid for the blizzard, but it was working out okay so far.

The flitter wobbled violently, and there was a loud scraping sound from below. So much for avoiding their paint donation. Erik didn’t like leaving that piece of evidence, but if the most advanced AI in the UTC couldn’t safely fly them through the blizzard, no one could.

“I can’t wait to test out the new rocket launchers,” Erik offered to take the others’ minds off the storm, and also because of his eagerness to discuss the new toys.

“A bit overstuffed with both rocket and grenade launchers,” Anne replied. “I don’t know if I like the tradeoff in loss of grenades.”

“Better flexibility,” Erik countered.

Kant chuckled. “It’s not like we won’t make good use of both of them. I agree, losing a few grenades is worth having the extra punch of direct-fire rockets, given the way you two attract tanks and other crazy stuff.”

“We don’t attract anything. We go to where the screaming and the trouble is and fight what’s there.”

Jia nodded. “It’s always better to have more firepower, especially with our luck, and we might need it on this raid and the other ones that are coming. I think Alina’s going to be keeping us busy for the next few months.”

“True enough.” Erik’s stomach loosened as the altimeter reading climbed. “Though, I’m surprised this is the juiciest.”

“Huh?” Jia replied. “Juiciest? What are you talking about?”

“It’s something Alina told me after the briefing,” Erik offered. “She said the ID is all but drowning in Core intelligence because of the successes we’ve had in the last six months or so. They’re launching constant missions, but our team is being saved for the juiciest stuff. p*****t, she said, for our dogged commitment to the cause.”

A bright flash lit up the outside, followed by others. Erik’s jaw tightened. If the enemy saw them, they could flood the area with antiaircraft fire, storm or not. They didn’t have to be close in this kind of weather to bring them down. More flashes followed.

“Coastal lightning,” Emma explained. “Closer than we would like, but we’re almost to the target site, so we should be able to avoid too much trouble. If not, well, I will admit you’ve been enjoyable…for fleshbags.”

As if punctuating her sentence, a hard gust hit the flitter. It jerked to the side, and while the exos’ docking stations kept them from being flung about, they didn’t do anything to protect their protesting stomachs.

“Yes,” Anne groaned. “This is so much fun.”

so“Beats getting shot,” Kant kicked back.

“So does major surgery, but I wouldn’t want that either,” Jia observed.

Erik frowned as an error message popped up on several of his faceplate readouts. “What’s going on, Emma?”

“Extremely high-powered jamming,” she replied. “It’s not very effective at this distance, assuming the source is the facility, but this does seem to confirm that despite the lack of significant activity observed by the satellites and the high-level recon flights, this is an active facility.”

“That means you’ll need to ride along once we get inside,” Erik commented.

“Oh, the places you take me. A grimy underground base filled with g*n goblins. What a delightful trip!”

Eric was impressed by the amount of dryness Emma could produce in her tone. “We don’t know it’s grimy.”

Furious shaking hit the cargo flitter, and more lightning flashed in the distance. A couple of quick shots from antiaircraft artillery, and they’d be splattered across the frozen ground and buried by meters of snow within minutes.

Emma sent a thermal image of a massive door that could easily accommodate the Argo or similar-sized ship, blocked off an entrance, to all four exos. In the frozen storm, the warmth at the edges of the door stood out. This might be an abandoned facility, but they were still supplying power to it.

ArgoThe cargo flitter slowed, though that put it at the mercy of crosswinds. It shook as Emma kept the vehicle steady, the door still in the distance.

Their initial mission plan had called for insertion from the air, with Emma using drones to relay comms, but they’d accepted that might not be practical with the storm, even before worrying about potential jamming.

On a more paranoid day, Erik might have suspected the Core of developing weather-control technology, but a blizzard in February in Iceland didn’t rise to the level of unusual.

Right before Emma set down, another fierce gust of wind tilted the flitter. It jerked and dipped, the back vibrating for a moment.

“Don’t worry about that,” Emma declared. “We’ll be able to fly back home fine without that grav emitter. It’ll require some mild compensation is all.” She settled into a comfortable pile of snow. “If I leave the external system on to keep it from getting buried, it’ll be obvious to enemy thermal scans.”

“It’s fine.” Erik released the docking clamps holding his exo and headed to the back, surprised at how grateful he was to be on the ground. “We’ll be making enough noise to keep them focused on us.”

Jia nodded her agreement. “If they had anything near the front, you would think they’d have already shot us with it.”

Kant moved his exo out of its docking port and lined up behind Erik and Jia. “Yep, time to beat down the Core.”

“When Agent Koval assigned us this mission,” Anne began, “she stressed potential intelligence value. We don’t have any reason to believe it’s that heavily defended.”

“It doesn’t hurt to test our new weapons,” Kant replied. “Dual rocket and grenade launchers, and top-level maneuverability. This is the best equipment I’ve used since joining the ID. Erik and Jia get all the great toys.”

Anne sighed. “Let’s just…stay focused.”

“I’ll get Emma, and we’ll get ready for the party.” Erik opened the exo, released the harness, and climbed out of the front, then jogged toward an IO port in the wall and pulled Emma out. He sprinted back to his exo, hopped inside, slotted her into the IO port, and slipped his harness back on.

“I think we’re all about to be glad for our thermally resistant tac suits,” Erik commented. “Emma, open the door. Nothing wrong with using laser comm to control it, right?”

“It’ll be fine at this distance, but I hope you weren’t under the impression I can manage to do anything useful if I’m far away from the flitter in this storm.”

“Nope. Just want you to be able to close the door after we leave. Don’t want to come back to a vehicle half-full of snow.”

The back door lowered to form a ramp, allowing them access to the howling storm outside. Harsh winds blew snow into the back, doing its best to bury them.

Erik had fought in almost every environment, including hard vacuum, and snowstorms were at the top of his most hated list.

Erik hurried out of the bay and toward the doors, his weapons at the ready. He expanded his shield and picked up the pace after the other three joined him.

The din of the storm swallowed the noise of the bay door as it closed behind them.

They advanced in a rough wedge formation through the angry snow swirling around them, blinding them. They were relying on thermal imaging to chart their course, but the heat signature was already diminishing, blues and greens beginning to swallow the yellows during their approach.

Between the storm and the jamming, all types of comm were pointless. Erik increased the volume on his mic instead. He didn’t want any misunderstandings.

“Something’s wrong,” he shouted.

“Maybe they shut off the power when they saw us coming?” Jia replied.

“Expect trouble. Kant, Jia, and Anne, stay wide. I’m going to go in close to the door and have Emma test the new hacking probes we got added to these exos.”

The team charged forward, rushing as effectively as they could manage in the dense snow, with the occasional thrust-assisted jump necessary. Nature sometimes provided very impressive defenses.

They arrived at the door without coming under fire or getting any indication other than the cooling thermal traces from inside that anything had changed. The Core might be planning to freeze them to death.

Nature could be weaponized.

Erik continued toward the door, looking for any sign of an IO port. “Well, s**t. This complicates things. Emma, any chance of remote access?”

“Not under current conditions,” Emma replied.

“Fine. There’s no reason to rely on subtlety at this point.” He backed away. “It’s time to break in our rocket launchers. Each of us will take two shots. Let’s concentrate on the center bottom to blow ourselves a nice new doorway.”

“Nothing like knocking loudly,” Kant declared. He didn’t even try to hide the glee in his voice.

“Everyone ready up,” Erik ordered. “Fire on my mark, then reload and fire when you want. Launch!”

Four rockets sped from the exos, their flaming trails lone spots of color in the dim gloom of the storm. They exploded on the surface of the door, the orange and red crawling along it and blasting out huge chunks. With practiced ease from experience and recent simulator runs, they reloaded and fired again. The next volley blew the weakened door apart, producing a small swirl of sharp gray metal that joined the snow.

The smoke started to clear and bright light spilled out through the hole, cutting through the churning mass of snow falling around them. A possible explanation for the temperature differentials became apparent as everyone turned off the thermal mode and returned to normal optics.

Two large cargo flitters, the backs open, were docked just inside the large circular tunnel. There was nothing distinctive about their markings, but their presence was almost incidental to what was around them.

Bodies. Lots of bodies. Dead men lay scattered around the entrance. Their bodies were mangled and torn, their rifles near them, some untouched, some sheared in half. The floors and walls were painted red with their blood. Though there were clusters, the bodies led deeper into the tunnel.

“Did not see that one coming,” Kant announced. “Kind of takes all the fun out of the a*s-kicking when they’re already dead.”

“It’s not too dark. Doesn’t even look completely dried,” Erik announced, advancing slowly. “This happened recently.”

Jia closed on Erik. “The questions are, who killed these men and why?”