Space Cadets (4 page)

Inside Man

Everything became clear when a young man strode forward and took the EMP from Samantha. We all stood stock still, hoping that it had really ended so cleanly, but we were wrong. He wasn’t disarming her.

He went about untying her as though it was no big deal.

Once free, Samantha ran towards me and I almost screamed but she just reached down and picked her weapon off the floor at my feet. Then she walked over and untied her fellow Skeptic.

She turned on Rick. “I’d drop your weapon if I were you.”

“Well you’re not me, so shut the fuck up.”

She just smiled and ignored him. She walked over to the young man who’d untied her and took the EMP from him. She kissed him on the mouth and said, “Thanks sweetheart.”

He grinned like a lovesick lunatic until she raised her weapon to him.

The look on his face was priceless, but it must have softened Samantha’s virtual heart because she lowered the gun and told her comrade to tie him up instead.

She said by way of an explanation, “I used you and now I have no more use for you. I don’t expect you to understand but I hope you appreciate that I spared your life.”

I was hoping he’d yell out,
fuck you
, or call her a
heartless bitch
, but instead he started to cry into his own chest.

Samantha sat him down gently in a crew members chair as he mumbled something or other to himself, and then she turned to face us again.

She tossed the EMP in the air and caught it. “I’m willing to die for my cause, are you?”

“Prove it,” said Rick, but Peggy said, “Shut up dude. She’s got us dead to rights.”

Rick said, “Alright lady, what the hell do you want?”

“I want you to drop your weapons. If you’re lucky, I’ll let you leave right before I turn off the quantum receiver, ensuring you never get to return to this ship in one of those suits.”

“No, stupid,” Peggy said. What do you want?”

“Ultimately, I want this ship.”

“Why?”

“If I tell you, I can never let you escape with your life. Are you sure you want me to answer?”

“Nah, I don’t care.”

“That’s what I thought. Now drop your weapons, you too Jack and Billy - I see you over there.”

I dropped my weapon first which wouldn’t have been embarrassing except that right after I did, Rick said, “You’ll have to pry it out of my cold dead hands.

I silently and slowly bent down and retrieved it. Samantha saw me and smiled wryly.

Before anything else could go wrong, everything went wrong. The ship’s lights went out and the gravity generator started acting wonky. I floated just a little bit off the ground and then I was slammed down so hard I almost crumpled to the floor.

What the hell was going on?

One of the flight crew sat at her console and took a look around outside.

Against the backdrop of planet,
Scum Earth
was a small, odd looking space craft. It looked alien in design.

Everyone forgot about the Skeptics and the EMP device. This was a game changer.

The first mate yelled, "All hands on deck. Prepare for attack."

Ace 2 Copyright Adam Moon 2013

All rights reserved

Here’s some back-story:

Two hundred years ago first contact with an alien race was made. They made it from Earth orbit as they observed us. But it wasn’t all roses and unicorns. The aliens abducted a couple million people and then they said they’d be back in a few hundred years. They were going to extensively study humanity and if we didn’t live up to whatever their standards were, they were going to eliminate us. Then they simply vanished.

That’s when we decided to militarize our space program. If they came back to kill us all, we’d be ready for them.

A fringe group called Skeptics don’t believe that actually happened. They cite a lack of evidence as proof that it’s a hoax perpetrated by the governments of the world to keep society down. They think they’re the good guys, fighting for the rights of the little man. They’re lunatics.

But at this very moment, my life is in their hands.

Contact

The warship Conquistador was in a bind. I had only been onboard the damn thing for a little over an hour and everything had already gone to hell. Just my luck.

My name is Jack Peterson and I’m a cadet from Deep Camp Eighty Seven that orbits Mars.

Me and my fellow classmates, along with two teachers had our minds teleported into Marine robots aboard the warship for a field trip. Some of us hoped to one day become Marines so this was a nice taste of things to come.

Our real bodies are cryo-frozen back at Mars but our minds are controlling these awesome space Marine mechs. While we’re here, we’re pretending to be A.C.E. pilots. It stands for Automated Combat Equipment, but no one calls them A.C.E. suits because it sounds silly. We call them skins or suits usually. I got extra lucky because my skin had once been used by a hero of mine by the name of Rick Pringle. He even signed the shoulder of the mech. He modded the crap out of it too.

Well, it turned out that my hot teacher, Mrs. Salazar is a saboteur. As soon as we left camp, it got raided by a band of Skeptics who murdered everyone there, students and instructors alike. Then they used the link to the Conquistador to upload themselves into skins of their own. The captain of the ship could’ve stopped that from happening except that now he has no head thanks to Mrs. Salazar.

There were eight Skeptics in all but I killed one while Mrs. Salazar and the rest went looking for the all-stop, a kill switch that would render all the suits immobile. They’d already taken their own kill switches out of their suits so the all-stop would only affect me and my fellow students.

Then something frighteningly awesome happened: My hero, Rick Pringle uploaded himself into one of the remaining suits. He was accompanied by a woman named Peggy. It was their job to stop the saboteurs.

They did a good job too, but as soon as all but one of her men was dead, Mrs. Salazar played a dirty trick and pulled out an EMP device. She figured, if she was going down, so was everyone else. That EMP would kill everyone wearing a mech. skin.

Because Rick Pringle is reckless, he didn’t give a damn about the EMP and he refused to drop his weapons. We might have all died because of his insolence except that the ship started acting nuts at that precise moment. All the lights went out and the gravity generators went on and off intermittently. By the time our systems came back online, an alien spacecraft appeared on the monitors.

That’s our current situation. It sucks.

My heart would be getting a workout if I had one. I’d be sweating if I wasn’t a robot.

Captain Wilkomen

Samantha Salazar clutched the EMP even tighter when the ship came into view. That scared the pants off of me.

The newly minted captain of the Conquistador issued his first order: “Prepare for attack.”

His nametag said, Jerry Wilkomen, First Mate. The old captain’s blood and brains still streaked down my faceplate. That was the reason we had a new captain.

The crew was well trained. They stepped over recently destroyed Marine suits and took their stations.

Thankfully, the ships systems seemed to be back online.

Mrs. Salazar was so transfixed on the image on the monitor that Rick Pringle simply walked over to her and snatched the EMP device right out of her hand. Too late, she tried to grab it back. Rick dropped it on the floor and stomped it flat with his humungous metal foot.

Mr. Humboldt, my interrogations instructor, placed a hand on my shoulder and said, “Let them worry about the alien ship. We need to turn off the all-stop and free the students. We’re toast if that ship attacks and all of our mechs are frozen stiff.”

I nodded absently. I didn’t really want to take my eyes off the monitor but I’d never had the guts to tell one of my teachers to get fucked.

My fellow students were going to go crazy when they found out that Rick Pringle was here with us. He was the ultimate badass. He was a living symbol of human might.

As we left the command room, Rick and Peggy were busy restraining Mrs. Salazar and her single remaining cohort.

The captain was saying something like,
probe the ship. See if we can hack its systems
and two dozen mechs stood stock still, frozen by the all-stop.

The all-stop was pasted in blood. The person in charge of it had been popped like a zit by whatever energy weapon Mrs. Salazar had used on him. Mr. Humboldt switched it off and we made our way back to the command room.

Rick was explaining to the new captain that he had to take the suit bay off-line. If he didn’t, he risked more saboteurs uploading themselves from Mars’ orbit to the ship.

Mrs. Salazar smirked and Peggy slapped her so hard in her fake, rubber face that her nose broke off. Peggy laughed like a nut and stepped on the nose. She ground it into paste beneath her immense foot.

To her credit, Mrs. Salazar didn’t seem too fazed.

The students’ mechs were now mobile again. Luckily each of them had a magnetic nametag on or there was no way I’d be able to tell who was who.

The captain said to Rick, “I need to keep the link to camp Eighty Seven open long enough to get these kids out of here. I need soldiers in those suits, not children.”

Rick shook his monolith sized head. “If there are Skeptics at camp Eighty Seven still, then you’d be sending the children to their deaths.”

“I don’t care. This is bigger than the lives of a couple dozen kids. I need experience.”

Rick slammed his fist down on the captain’s console hard enough to get all of our attention. “It’s within my rights to take command of this vessel. You know who I am. You know I’ll do it. The kids stay.”

The captain shook his head sadly. “If that ship’s the Enemy, your decision could cost lives.”

“I can live with that. Thank you for being reasonable. I’d make a terrible captain anyway.”

Enemy
is what some people called the aliens who’d visited earth two hundred years ago.

But the small ship on the monitor didn’t exactly inspire fear or awe. If that was the Enemy, we’d kick the crap out of them, for sure.

The captain said to his crew, “Where are we with hacking their systems?”

No one said a word. The silence was finally interrupted by static from the loudspeakers.

An Ensign said, “I might be wrong, but it appears they’ve hacked their way through our system.”

An odd, guttural voice issued over the speakers. It was English, but the voice was far too soft and monotone, with no inflection or emotion.

“Greetings alien ship,” the voice said.

The captain asked his Ensign, “Can you open a channel to respond?”

The alien voice said, “That won’t be necessary. The channel works both ways.”

“What are you doing out here?”

“We are fleeing our home planet. This is a colony ship on its way to a new world.”

“What happened on your home planet?”

“Civil unrest and warfare.”

“I would like to board your craft. Can that be arranged?”

“I’m sorry, but no.”

The captain seemed to be out of ideas.

Rick Pringle said aloud, “I will board your craft. Will you try and stop me?”

There was a prolonged silence but the aliens finally answered, “We do not wish you any harm. We are a peaceful race, just trying to start fresh. Please do not board our vessel.”

“I’m coming over,” Rick said. "I'm in a mechanical suit, so don't be alarmed. I'm actually a human being from a planet called Earth. Open an airlock for me."

The static ceased as the link was severed. The alien ship turned on its axis and its boosters ignited. It vanished from view.

The captain yelled, “I want a heading and a speed on that ship.”

A navigations officer started to say, “Their headed towards…” but the captain said over him, “Just plug the numbers in and give chase.”

The Conquistador began to turn around.