The Final Wars End Read online

  Hani and Bastien traded glances. His eyes brimmed with sympathy. She shook her head and said, “He had to be taken care of. Otherwise, we wouldn’t have been able to get Reo.”

  Point taken. When they’d dropped into the room from its ventilation shaft, the guard had required being dealt with so as not to pose a threat. With access to the prison’s security system, he could have raised alarm.

  “He didn’t have to die, though,” Bastien countered.

  “Bas,” Hani sighed, “with this world being the way it is, you’re going to have a hard time not pulling the trigger.” Her worldview was bleak – there was no room for righteous men in it. For her, one had to be a monster when living amongst monsters. But Bastien didn’t agree. Up until recent events, he’d managed to withhold from killing, for the most part, even despite his ten years in the Martian military. A lone hostage situation had made him break that covenant with Father Paul to never take a life.

  The man always preached, “Just because we are surrounded by monsters doesn’t mean we have to become monsters ourselves.” Made sense then. And despite all that had happened, it still made sense.

  Hani jumped and pulled herself up into the shaft. Bastien held Reo up as if he was a rag doll, and Hani hauled him into darkness. Moments later, the two were climbing the steep, metal chute, pushing Reo along. When he finally exited, Bastien found himself back on top of the prison’s roof. A concrete jungle enveloped him, with numerous two to four storied buildings spreading away in every direction. Fuchū prison was massive.

  After slinging Reo over his shoulder, he broke into a sprint with nothing but escape on his mind. Him and Hani leapt from rooftop to rooftop and headed towards the prison’s eastern edge, appearing as if black specters melting in and out of shadows.

  The perimeter wall could be made out soon enough. A tiny voice of excitement echoed inside his head – the mission was almost over. Within minutes, he was scaling down the concrete wall. Rushing over to a dark alley some blocks from the prison, they merged into its shadows as a remote alarm went off. It blared somewhere deep within Fuchū.

  “Fuck, they’re onto us,” Hani exclaimed.

  “How? You’d hacked off the cameras.”

  “There must have been one I missed somewhere along the way.” Hani trekked the alley to its end. A red Nissan roadster waited in the shadows. “Akira,” she called out to her ride. Lights turned on across the grill, activated by her voice, and a low hum vibrated the car’s engine.

  Turning to Bastien, she said, “We’ll have to keep our guard up. The security system’s facial recog will pinpoint us.”

  “Can it trace us back to the Collective’s hideout?” Bastien set Reo in the backseat with some strain – the car didn’t offer much in terms of room.

  “Hope not,” Hani said and stared back towards the alley’s entrance. Worry furrowed her brow. “Let’s get outta here for now.”

  Bastien plopped into the passenger seat, the same seat he’d bled all over just days back. This time around he was in better shape, physically and mentally, although, he couldn’t shake the feeling their troubles were about to balloon.

  “Onward and upward,” he said more to himself than Hani.

  CHAPTER 2: CUBE

  The Nipponese space fleet appeared on the burnt orange Martian horizon like a fast approaching hurricane. Twenty Kamikaze spacecraft, each resembling a blue medicine capsule fifteen feet in length, and two twenty-foot tall mobile suits comprised that cloud of wrath. They were coming to wage war, to leave an indelible mark on Port Sydney. If their presence wasn’t enough to roil the Sydneysiders, a dark dust storm brewed on the ground miles below the fleet, its nebulous form devouring the landscape one hill, one crevice at a time. The coincidental alignment of Martian nature and lunar attack made for an intimidating sight.

  Cube remained undeterred though. It stood stoic, its otherwise red eye a bibulous black. Data streamed within its processors like a waterfall of ones and zeros.

  > ASSAILANT: 22 enemy targets

  > TYPE: Kamikaze generation 3, Space Mobile Suits generation 5

  > ENEMY SPEED: 100 miles/hour

  > PROJECTED ENGAGEMENT: 5 minutes

  Nine other attack-bots, similar in appearance and stature to Cube, flanked the robot on its right. Each stood tall with a plasma gun in hand. The blackness of their eyes matched Cube’s. They were ready for the coming battle.

  Port Sydney, that gargantuan one-mile square with ten stories stacked one mile high, loomed in all its whiteness a couple hundred feet behind the line of automatons. At ground level, the complex was a daunting structure – an impregnable fortress of steel. But from the sky, it was an easy target. A big, white box waiting to be shot at. A design flaw, of course, but nothing else was to be expected of human creations. There was always a flaw. Cube stated, “Stupid humans.”

  Luckily for the Sydneysiders, the colony was outfitted with second-generation laser cannons, all mounted atop its roof. There was also a fleet of fifteen spacecraft and ten tanks that went with that line of defense. So, while the big white box could be shot at, it could not only defend itself, but also, bite back.

  “Prepare to engage,” Cube communicated with the other attack-bots via its internal audio unit. They readied their focus on the enemy and the jetpack secured to each one’s back roared to life.

  A shriek reverberated the sky as three white 1.V9s and ten of their lesser cousins, the 1.V8s flew over them and towards the lunar hostiles in a triangle formation. Ion propulsion engines clicked, banged and shook the atmosphere. The Martian fleet appeared as if winged demons, their symmetrical hulls resembling the blade of a two-headed battle-axe.

  “For the High Council.” Cube’s tone was monotone. “To battle.” The ten robots shot into the sky, comet trails of energy propelling their flight. Cube commanded, “Triangle formation.”

  Their flight path arched up from the Martian terrain and towards the Nipponese. Ahead, the Martian spacecraft had already engaged the enemy. Laser and heat-seeking missiles danced and erupted as if fireworks over the horizon. A craft, its origin indiscernible amongst the confusion, exploded in a blinding flash and whatever was left of it, crashed into a jagged, mountain cliff. The first casualty of the battle. Nothing burned because of the lack of oxygen in the Martian atmosphere.

  Cube flew past the crash site and took aim at a Kamikaze with its gun. A ball of plasma shot forth from the sleek barrel. It missed. The tic-tac Kamikaze dove sideways, reducing altitude dramatically. Cube followed.

  A burnt sienna landscape enlarged, its cracks and crevices widening at an alarming rate. The Kamikaze, fully aware of its pursuer, flew into a fissure and its blue exterior blackened from the darkness. Undeterred, Cube followed and remained locked on the target by way of visual heat signatures. Plasma shots were fired one after another. Some hit the target, doing little harm to its polymer composite material armor, while others missed.

  The Kamikaze escaped the crevice as it executed an Immelmann turn, performing the first half of an upward loop and gaining altitude, and when completely inverted, rolling into the upright position. In those seconds, Cube analyzed a schematic view of the enemy’s flight path within its processing units to project where the craft would position at the end of the maneuver. In this manner, instead of continuing to tail, Cube headed directly to the forecasted geographical coordinates. The robot’s nimble physique, when compared to the Kamikaze – a craft ten times Cube’s weight and size – allowed for precise engagement.

  Plasma fire left the gun barrel and split open the enemy cockpit window. The sudden depressurization, accompanied by an explosion along the craft’s dashboard computer, plummeted the Kamikaze. Its occupants stood zero chance of survival. The craft collided with a mountain and blasted into smithereens.

  “For the High Council,” Cube stated. Nine similar proclamations from its automaton compatriots reverberated within the built-in audio unit. One of them, Delta, screeched violently as it succumbed to enemy fire. A loud b
ang followed. The robotic team of ten had endured a casualty.

  The Martian orange sky flashed supernova white every few seconds as projectiles found their marks. Detonations and missile-fire banged through the air, trembling the high altitudes like thunder. Cube prepared to chase after another Kamikaze when it received a blow from an unseen force. It fell from the sky, rolling and tumbling through the air all the while, and when it tried regaining control, another hit followed, this time from the right.

  Cube crashed into a steep mountainside like a meteor and slid to the bottom along with balls of dust as if it was a discarded scrap of metal. It righted itself into a crouched battle-stance at the bottom, unfazed by the fall. A mobile suit landed hundred feet ahead on its thick metal feet. The humanoid giant robot towered, its blue exterior flashing bright underneath the battle’s fire above. Its pilot, a human male in his twenties, sat within the suit’s bulletproof glass-encased chest cavity – the mech’s cockpit. He’d piloted the suit through space and was now prepared to fight.

  “Banzai!” He yelled the Nipponese war cry through a speaker in the suit and commanded the suit into a sprint. Bulky on account of its heavily armored construction, it shook the ground like an earthquake. Cube aimed its gun at the assailant’s sphere of a head, but before the trigger could be pulled, a Martian sandstorm engulfed the land.

  Gusts up to 150 kilometers per hour whacked the terrain with merciless fury. Dust slapped Cube and particles found their way into the robot’s joints. It was like getting sandblasted. But Cube endured. Sydneysider attack-bots like Cube were designed to withstand such brutal conditions on Mars. Nonstick films encased their armor. The sand simply fell away and never lodged in any of the interior mechanics. But it was an altogether different story for the Nipponese mobile suit.

  Unaccustomed to such conditions while it patrolled Earth’s moon, the mech wasn’t designed to withstand Martian elements. Its twenty-foot tall silhouette lumbered in the storm trying to gain its bearings and sight – visibility had been cut down to just a few feet. Lasers shot from the artillery canons mounted on both its shoulders and attacked the landscape at random. Chunks of rocks flew to and fro with each blast.

  Cube took a few steps in the swirling storm and aimed its gun. A single plasma shot exploded the mech’s round head, rendering the suit’s diagnostics and processors useless. The pilot was now blind – demoted to manual maneuvering.

  Another plasma blast took out a knee. The humanoid buckled to its left and crashed like an old statue. Cube would have smiled if it could. A file ran deep within its processors.

  > EMOTION: Happiness.dat

  It was the closest the attack-bot would ever get to feeling. Cube reached the enemy moments later and clambered atop its body. The pilot was visible despite the swirling debris. He cowered within the shattered glass cockpit.

  “Stupid human,” Cube said, then shot the Nipponese in the face.

  CHAPTER 3: ALICE

  Upon exiting the docking bay’s sliding hatch door, the 1.V10, that magnificent triangular craft one hundred by five hundred feet in height and length respectively, rose into the atmosphere like a dragon. The light of distant explosions reflected against its sleek white armored hull. Port Sydney’s prized weapon was en route to battle the Nipponese. If it had been a person, it would have thrust out its chest in a show of confidence, for there weren’t many that could match its strength and dexterity. It was easily the strongest ship in the solar system, the second strongest being the 1.V9s and their counterparts, the Nipponese Kamikazes. At around 1,500 tons, she was built for action, her sleek lines carrying unequalled firepower. It was the kind of craft enemies feared – and dreamed of taking for their own at the same time.

  “Captain Walsh, talk to me,” Alice commanded from the craft’s control bay chair.

  “All systems go.” The headset crackled briefly. “We are ready to engage.”

  “Good.” Alice took a deep breath. “Let’s give them hell.”

  The 1.V10 listed to the right and shot forward like a bullet. A brilliant red laser beamed from the fourth generation canon mounted atop its nose. The projectile cut through a Kamikaze as if the craft was paper origami. The enemy target’s middle section disintegrated into thousands of specks, its armor unable to withstand the beam’s kilo-joules worth of condensed energy, and its two ends fell apart like a cracked eggshell. As they tumbled to the Martian surface, human limbs and guts spewed out the sides.

  “Good shot, Captain,” Alice said as she rejoiced, banging the chair’s armrest with a fist. Her auburn eyes burned with ambition as they tracked enemy crafts, denoted by blue dots along the computer screen ahead. The screen displayed the cockpit’s view. She wanted nothing more than to please the High Council. “We will humiliate the Nipponese.”

  Another Kamikaze was destroyed with a single shot. “Hurrah!” Captain Walsh shouted over the headset, his voice nearly cracking with excitement.

  “How many enemy fatalities?”

  “Twelve out of twenty Kamikazes are down, and one of the mobile suits is confirmed non-operational, General.”

  There was still work left to be done. With gritted teeth, Alice said, “I want them all destroyed.”

  The 1.V10 maneuvered around various tactical dogfights at play between the Sydneysiders and the Nipponese. Her agility was awe-inspiring. A craft her size moving and twisting in the manner she did was nothing short of an engineering marvel. Much had been seen in its short career – it had nearly been destroyed when invading New Paris. But that time had been under Cube’s command. “Not under my watch,” Alice whispered.

  A few more Kamikazes were taken out, their hulls obliterated by either the 1.V10’s laser fire or its missiles. Soon only two were left. The Nipponese fleet was on the verge of extinction. The Sydneysiders, on the other hand, had suffered only two casualties, and majority of their crafts and attack-bots still filled the sky like an angry swarm of bees.

  “They underestimated us.” Alice cracked a wry smile. “Soon, they will regre—”

  The 1.V10 shook from an attack on the left. There was another hit, this time from above. Something fast maneuvered around the craft and took shots.

  “It’s a mobile suit,” Captain Walsh yelled. The 1.V10 banked right and dropped altitude to outmaneuver the attacker. A massive blue mech came into view on Alice’s computer screen. Two giant ion propulsion jetpacks allowed it to fly and move with the skill of a hummingbird. It shot white laser beams at the 1.V10, and several hit their mark.

  Alice jolted left to right in her chair. She screamed, “Take it out!”

  “I’m trying!” Walsh shouted back. “The thing is too fast.”

  The two opponents traded lasers. White beams shot past red ones and burnt armor. But the attackers remained undeterred. They continued their dance like two boxers hell bent on destruction.

  “Missiles,” Alice shouted, “Use the missiles.”

  Two heat-seeking missiles were fired but they flew past the target. Walsh said, “The suit must have anti-heat capabilities.”

  “Do something!” Alice was flustered, a first for the General. Her heart sped at 160 beats per minute, a rate it had never reached before. She was designed as a superior being, but at moment, she feared like any ordinary human.

  “Got an idea,” Walsh said. He was the epitome of calm. The 1.V10 raced forward, and the plan became obvious to Alice in that second– her subordinate intended to ram into the mech. If lasers couldn’t hurt it and heat-seeking missiles missed it, then a direct impact was the only option left.

  The craft was too fast for the mobile suit and banged into it with all of its three million pounds. The mech blasted into smithereens upon impact, its pilot crushed into a pulp. As pieces of flesh and metal spiraled away, Walsh yelled, “Hurrah!”

  Alice took a deep breath and leaned back into her plush, leather chair. She smiled. “Good work, Walsh. Good work.” Her heartbeat slowed to its fifty-six beats per minute, the normal range of her design.

>   CHAPTER 4: BELLE

  Existing digitally was strange, like floating within a large body of water, one that stretched forever in all directions. This was an ocean where every water molecule – its three atoms, two hydrogen and one oxygen – were actually data bytes flowing freely. They were cool and wet to the naked touch. Here one could move without biological constraints, where gravity didn’t exist, where the laws of physics could be seemingly subverted. This was quantum computing. Belle could stay the size she’d been when living within the confines of flesh and blood, or she could scale to the height of Eifel Tower. She could even shrink to the size of an atom. Her proportions didn’t matter in this new form. Nor did her appearance. Sometimes she appeared as she had as a biological being – a thirty-something, milk-skinned woman of five-foot-two with blue cropped hair and green, catlike eyes. At other times she appeared as a massive blue whale ambling in no certain direction.

  There was nothing around as far as the eyes could see except for deep blue that turned pitch black at the edges of her vision. If she could feel depressed or anxious, she would have screamed at the unnerving emptiness of it all. But Belle had surpassed the capacity to feel such emotions. In this place, she was connected to the never-ending, vacant ocean. It was an extension of her, or, more likely, she a representation of it. She could not only move within it as she wished, but she could also manipulate the ocean itself. Those data bytes of H2O compounds were hers to influence at will. Standing water could be churned into waterspouts, or a massive parabola, or even her recreation of New Paris.

  A bubble the size of a small school of fish floated below her bare feet, and within it there were ones and zeros crafted into tunnels, chambers and even representations of people long dead. The city of her birth, the last human enclave on planet Earth that once boasted a population of a quarter-million, now lay in ruins in a terrestrial desert and only existed as a simulation within this ocean she called home. Belle could enter it and leave it at will. It was her playground, she its god. Here she was Shiva, Buddha, Allah and Jesus, all rolled into one – an entity of computerized enlightenment with no attachments or fears.