******
Julius gazed outside his cockpit as he maneuvered the Z-20 fighter into the enemy’s lair. A veil of black clouds covered the machine moon, bubbling over it like a broth inside a witch’s cauldron. Tendrils of electricity suddenly reached out across the cloud cover, piercing the darkness for a moment and revealing what looked like the outline of structures on the surface.
Emerging from the A.I. Moon, an arm of nanobots streamed out and reached out for his fighter.
“Captain Verndock, you are ordered to return to the Intimidator and begin an immediate pull out from the combat zone. Do you copy?”
Julius ignored the order from his superiors. Earlier, he gave Ramey command of the Intimidator with standing orders to keep the nanobot swarm at bay while he took his Z-20 down to the moon. The A.I. had attacked the HAMR pods, destroying or deflecting many of them from their intended drop zone. Daryl’s pod was one of the ones off course, but he managed to safely touch down on the surface. Unfortunately, his HAMR had been damaged by the attack and could not deploy. With none of the other HAMR platoons anywhere near his position, he could die down there—and Julius would have none of that.
“Daryl—I’m almost there. I will make contact with you again after I break through the atmosphere.”
There was a slight delay before the response came back: “Acknowledged, sir.”
“Is everything okay down there?” Julius asked.
“Yes, Captain. I’m just commanding my platoon.”
Despite being in a compromised situation, Daryl still had the sense of duty to continue leading his HAMR platoon remotely.
As Julius swooped his fighter into the atmosphere, he glanced to his right at the nanobots. Flashes of ignitions erupted from within the nanobot tendril as the Intimidator’s cannons continued to pelt it with munitions. In a few more seconds, he would penetrate the moon’s atmosphere and hopefully be outside the swarm’s reach.
“Lieutenant Ramey,” came the voice on the link again, “we are ordering you to pull the Intimidator from the combat zone, immediately!”
If they made it out of this alive, poor Ramey would probably be court-martialed along with him—or worse.
Julius opened a conference link to the Intimidator.
“Ramey, you’ve done enough. Get the Intimidator to safety.”
“Are you sure, Captain?”
Julius felt the fighter buckle—he was beginning to enter the moon’s atmosphere.
“Yes—and thanks.”
“Good luck, sir.”
The craft shook more violently and he had to fight the controls all the way, but as soon as he delved into the depths of the swirls of dark clouds, it stopped. For several minutes, all he saw was blackness in every direction. He waited with anticipation, knowing that he would soon be among the first humans to see what lurked beneath the A.I. Moon’s atmosphere.
The cloud cover abruptly cleared and he saw the surface of the machine moon. Julius could not tell if what he saw was real or an illusion. A cityscape of buildings rose up from the ground, but they were not normal structures.
Everything was made up of a complex lattice of intersecting green lines, giving the appearance of three-dimensional objects. The mass in between the lines was black and devoid of any texture. To Julius, the scene seemed like an unfinished computer-generated simulation.
He opened up a conference channel to Daryl.
“Daryl, this is Julius, do you read me?”
The response came quicker this time: “Yes, Captain. I see you on my sensors. There are no hostiles in my area. It is clear for approach.”
“On my way, Daryl.”
Julius flew his fighter through the artificial world, following the telemetry readout to Daryl’s position. The capsule-shaped pod stood out against the lattice surroundings, making it easy to spot. It was tilted to its side and a portion of it disappeared into the artificial ground. Green lines from the intricate lattice design wrapped around it, entrapping it like a spider-web.
Julius landed his craft alongside the HAMR pod. As his fighter’s skids touched the ground, he noticed an artificial matrix of vegetation bend under the weight. Surprisingly, his onboard sensors detected a breathable, Earth-like atmosphere outside. Nevertheless, he took the precaution of putting on his environment suit before exiting the ship.
“Okay, Daryl, get in your environment suit. I’m going to help you get out of here.”
Julius left his fighter, noting the lighter gravity as he stepped out. There seemed to be an artificial light source that provided an even spread of illumination everywhere—he could not identify or see where the source of this light was. As he scanned the unusual surroundings, he noticed what looked like a residential home nearby. It appeared to be made up of the same mesh of intersecting lines. However, something else caught his eye.
Standing in lifelike poses were human figures. They did not move and could have been part of the simulation, except they were not made up of patterns of lines like everything else—they looked real. He would have liked to investigate it, but he needed to get Daryl out of there.
“Are you in your suit?” he spoke into the conference channel.
“No, sir.”
“Well then get in it! We need to get out of here now.”
Daryl did not respond.
“Are you ready? Is there a problem?”
“No problem, sir—I am just not leaving yet.”
“What are you talking about, Daryl? I came here to get you out—we need to go.”
“I’m sorry, Captain—but I have my duty. My platoon needs me.”
“Daryl—I am ordering you to get in your suit and vacate the pod! Do you understand?”
“I’m sorry, sir—but I must refuse that order.”
The argument continued for a moment longer, but his stubborn little brother was not budging from his position. Julius looked at the pod, trying to determine if he could lift it off the ground using his fighter’s tow beam.
“Sir, please back away,” Daryl’s voice warned.
At that moment, the pod began to rumble and it emitted a mechanical sound. Julius moved away from the pod, watching a ring of gas suddenly vent from it. The bottom of the capsule-shaped pod ejected, the lid bouncing off the lattice ground and hurling into the air. From inside the pod, a machine rolled out of it and darted across the ground a couple of meters before coming to a stop.
The HAMR unfolded itself and raised up on its bipedal legs. It stood about two and a half meters tall, its torso compact and stealthy with no visible limbs other than its mechanical legs. Julius knew that inside the torso were retractable weaponry and limbs, all controlled by its pilot through a special neural mind-link.
“Can you please visually inspect the exterior,” a robotic voice asked.
Julius knew it was Daryl’s. While in the mind-link, Daryl had no way to use verbal communication; the voice ensued directly from the HAMR’s computer interpreting his brainwave patterns.
Julius approached him and gave it a thorough look.
“It looks fine—no visible damage. If your propulsion is operational, we should leave.”
“Negative. I cannot leave yet. I am remotely monitoring and commanding my platoon.”
Julius noticed with some discomfort that the words sounded mechanical and cold, as if it was really a machine talking. He had to remind himself that Daryl was really inside it.
“Fine. What is their sitrep?”
“They are on the move from grid G2–10 and shadowing the Reds. The group is approaching the entryway into the core with Alpha Red and Beta Red in close combat with hostiles. The HAMR shielding is functioning as designed, repelling the nanobot attacks.”
“Casualties?”
“No communications or telemetry from Alpha Black and Beta Black since their initial drop.”
Twenty-four soldiers probably dead—all of them kids. Daryl’s platoon was the only Black platoon left—the onl
y ones equipped to perform the shutdown operation within the A.I. Moon’s core. Their only chance now rested in Daryl’s ability to remotely lead the assault.
As much as he wanted to get his little brother out of there, he understood that the success of the mission and the survival of humanity was at stake—they may not get another chance like this again.
“All right, Daryl—continue what you’re doing,” he said, then looked over to the nearby home that caught his eye. “I’m going to do some reconnoitering.”
Julius traversed easily through the low gravity, trotting to the home several meters away. As he approached, he was able to confirm what he discerned from a distance, the people did indeed appear to be real—or at least, more real than the surroundings.
It was two of them, a man and a woman, standing on the front lawn of the home in casual attire. They both stared out in the distance, beaming a lifeless smile to no one. Julius touched one of them with his gloved finger, feeling the depression from his touch in the lifelike skin.
“This is really strange,” he said. “These people… they seem so real.”
Julius waved his hand in front of their faces. As the shadow of his hand passed over them, he was shocked at what he saw in their eyes—their pupils reacted to the change in light.
“Daryl,” he said. “I think these people—I think they’re… real.”
At that moment, he felt a sudden vibration in the ground. Julius looked toward the landing zone. On the ground, he saw a black, circular crater forming—spreading outward and making the ground collapse into it. Daryl’s HAMR rapidly moved toward him, escaping—but Julius’ fighter was engulfed by it. After a moment, the hole ceased growing and the vibrations subsided.
Daryl’s HAMR stopped by Julius, pivoting sidewise to look at the crater.
“What happened?” Julius asked.
“I don’t know. My sensors picked up an energy reading back there, which gave me just enough warning to escape.” Daryl paused. “Sir, something else: I have lost communication with the platoons.”
“Are your instruments damaged?”
“Negative. All systems are functioning, but nothing is being received.”
“What about the Reds? Can you communicate with them?”
“Sir, I have no telemetry on any of them. All the platoons are gone.”
Julius’ heart sank—the mission had failed.
“What was the last thing that happened?” Julius asked.
“Delta Black had penetrated the entryway and was marching into the core. Everything appeared to be going well, then there was silence.”
At that moment, Julius felt a rumbling in the ground and sensed movement coming from the crater that drew his attention. From inside its depths, a slew of green lattice lines flew up like a series of strings, and then dove to the ground. The lines snaked across the ground, constructing themselves into complex polygonal shapes.
As Julius watched, the mesh of objects slowly formed into a recognizable series of constructions. It did not take him long to recognized what it was creating: HAMRs—two dozen of them. Soon, the simulation was finished and the crater was gone, replaced by the stationary HAMR platoons lined up in three rows.
Within the transparent meshes, Julius noticed something inside them. He adjusted the visual magnification of his suit. What he saw verified the horror that he suspected. Inside the mechanized robots were the bodies of the missing platoon pilots, in the same suspended animation as the couple standing before him.
“Josh… Mike …” Daryl said. “We have to rescue them!”
Before Julius could say anything to stop him, Daryl’s HAMR leapt forward and ran toward them. He was about to chase after him when the ground suddenly began to shake. Around him, the lattice lines blinked erratically and sections of the ground seemed to disappear.
The artificial sky’s cloud cover changed from black to white and the illumination around him became increasingly brighter. He looked to the distant horizon and watched the artificial cityscape collapse, falling into the chasm beneath the moon’s surface.
“It’s the shutdown effect!” Daryl’s voice echoed in his helmet.
They had done it—the platoon had succeeded. But now the moon would follow its creator into death, and without his fighter to fly out of there, Julius would die with it.
“You need get out of here, Daryl! Use your thrusters!” he pleaded.
Daryl ignored him, marching the HAMR back to his position. Julius had to avert his eyes down to the ground as the brightness of the sky became blinding. He watched the artificial grass and vegetation at his feet begin to recede beneath the earth. Eventually, the ground itself would give way and he would fall into the chasm—joining the graveyard of constructs the A.I. had created.
At that moment, Julius felt something brush his leg. He whirled around to see that the human couple was no longer held in stasis and had collapsed to the ground. The woman fell close to him, and had her hand on his boot.
Julius knelt down and grabbed her hand. Her eyes searched the surroundings in shock.
Who is she? he thought to himself. How did she get here?
“It’s okay,” he said to her, not quite sure what else to say. “Don’t panic. We’ll get you home.”
It was a lie, but perhaps it would give her some peace in these last moments.
She looked up at him, her glossy brown eyes locked onto his, reflecting the brightness of the demise around them. Rather than tear up, project terror, or close her eyes in fear—she smiled at him. It was a genuine smile… of relief.
Daryl reached them, his HAMR’s shadow covering them both.
“Get out of here, Daryl!” he yelled.
There was no response from him and the telemetry data inside his suit was out—perhaps he could not even hear him.
In that moment, the woman grabbed Julius’ arm, squeezing so tightly at the environmental suit’s fabric that he worried she would pierce through it.
The ground became unstable, losing its sturdiness and dropping in clumps like quicksand into the chasm. Resigned to his fate, Julius put his hand over hers and looked at her, waiting for the inevitable. She stared back at him, that smile never leaving her lips, even as everything disappeared into the whitest of hells.