Gwen sat at the edge of the Russell Crater, attempting to digitally zoom the camera in on what she’d found. Once she’d left the habitat, she hadn’t even needed the map. Ehrly’s footprints led to the truck, and its wheels left a trail all the way to Russell Crater. Without wind or rain, nothing but meteorites or men would erase them.
What left the other set of tracks though—the tank treads that go right to the airlock?
She closed her eyes, breathing slowly. She was good at stress management, but she’d started to feel the crushing emptiness of the void ten minutes after leaving Moonlight One. Then she’d felt the crushing weight of being the only human on the moon, followed by Jonas’s theory that Ehrly had exploited her and been killed by a DoD security robot. She wouldn’t let herself cry, though. She knew that would come later, when she was safe. For now, she had to be strong.
She opened her eyes.
Focus on now. Ehrly’s dead. Don’t join him.
She kept the camera on full-motion video as long as the batteries would hold out, and she wasn’t disappointed. The empty spacesuit stood at the edge of the crater for a full fifteen minutes before one of the security robots impaled it from behind.
She’d followed Jonas’s instructions to the letter, keeping a low profile and remaining in the shadows. The truck remained hidden behind a large rock two hundred meters away.
What were you into Ehrly? Who were you sending information to?
Everyone had seen Armageddon, Jonas had reasoned—even men at the Pentagon whose job it was to worry about mankind’s continued existence. They would have seen a lunar launch platform for nuclear missiles as a four-day head start against an extinction event, and with less fuel required to achieve escape velocity.
“Keep the rocks between you and them,” Jonas had said. “They’ll likely have thermal cameras, and the truck will radiate heat even if your suit insulates your body. They’ll have normal optics, too. The same guys that watched Armageddon watched Predator.”
Of course they couldn’t tell anyone about the platform or set up restricted, no-go zones on the moon, unless they wanted to keep it staffed perpetually. The staffing and launch schedule would’ve drawn attention, and then everyone would know there were nukes on the moon. No, it was better to post a few automated sentries with bladed weapons to keep the site secure. Standard small arms would’ve cold welded together in the vacuum of space, as would a railgun and its projectiles.
The Space Shuttle program had been the perfect cover. They couldn’t land on, or take off from, the moon since they required standard airstrips and wings that didn’t work in the vacuum. They did, however, have large cargo bays that absolutely no one on Earth paid attention to. They were perfect for secondary launches of lunar landers with materials to build the launch platform. If it had been carried out by DoD, Project Horizon would’ve failed miserably, and everyone knew it. Only a civilian organization with seemingly innocent intent could carry out mankind’s finest wall of defense against the void.
I’m just amazed I never pictured an ICBM in the bay of a Space Shuttle until Jonas suggested it. What did people think NASA was doing up here—science experiments with houseplants?
Having captured enough provably undoctored footage to show what had killed Ehrly, Gwen crept backward into the shadows toward the truck.
Now to upload.
It wasn’t ideal, but she’d been left no choice. If she showed LunarX what she’d found, they’d quietly meet with NASA and subsequently lock her away for Ehrly’s murder. They’d be good Americans and sacrifice one for the good of many.
I’ll be damned if I’m going to be that one. This is going to every media outlet I can find in the next three days.
Gwen hooked into the truck’s supplementary oxygen and eased away from Russell Crater.
Nobody really uses ham radio that much anymore,” Jonas typed. “The Internet took over for indestructible communication, and it’s more versatile. That’s how Ehrly knew no one would catch on his exchanging information through swap meets. The FCC and NSA pay far more attention to more-advanced, more widely accessible media.”
Jonas looked down from the screen of his new laptop to his cowboy boots. They weren’t his style, and they were therefore perfect.
“All that time, he was trying to sell secrets I knew nothing about,” Gwen said.
“The thing is, I used to think he needed space every time he went to the roof. He may very well have been talking to a handler. He’s the one that got me into ham radio back then.”
Gwen fell silent for a moment.
“He only turned on the charm after I got the internship with LunarX. He saw a way to get to the moon,” she said finally.
Jonas sighed, looked away from the screen.
You were the only one that was ever in color for me, and you left me for a damned liar—a traitor.
“I’m sorry for your loss, Gwen,” he typed.
The cursor blinked for several seconds on Jonas’s screen before another message appeared.
“I heard a noise,” Gwen said. “I think maybe something followed me from Russell Crater. I’m starting the upload in case something goes wrong.”
While Jonas watched an upload percentage bar 238,900 miles away, Gwen crept stealthily across the rain forest floor.
There it was again—a mechanical clinking and grinding that didn’t coincide with anything in the biosphere. It sounded like tank treads.
She knew the thing probably wouldn’t have aural sensors, since its creators would only have expected it to operate in the nearly non-existent lunar atmosphere. She moved as quietly as she could nonetheless, not wanting to make a fatal error based on an assumption.
The auxiliary lighting flickered out along the path.
She looked up at the cameras that linked to LunarX Mission Command. Both of their red “live feed” LEDs had gone dark.
These were the last things Ehrly saw before it caught up to him. I wonder if the bot hacked our power grid itself, or if he has help on the ground.
She started toward the storage room, with all the extra pipe and replacement parts. She hadn’t really gauged the reach of the sentry’s arms, but a steel pipe was probably her best bet.
This is near where I found Ehrly’s body. He must’ve thought the same thing.
LG 4-201 rolled into Target M’s last known position. A pair of red-orange footprints illuminated the undergrowth, but the trail ended there.
LG 4-201 panned its optical array 90 degrees left, then right. It switched between the human-visible spectrum and thermal several times, knowing the human could insulate herself in a spacesuit.
Gwen floated to the ground behind LG 4-201.
It had taken a bit of work to break the limb with her bare hands, but she’d finally managed to wrench it free. When she’d leaped into the branches, she’d prayed that the thing wouldn’t look up as it searched for her. She’d bent the forked, leafy branch back and forth harder and harder until it tore. She needed the bushiest stick she could get—that’s what Steve Irwin had always used to pin down snakes.
She swung and hit the back of the robot’s head, but didn’t feel it give at all.
LG 4-201 spun on its treads—fast.
Too fast.
Its slow, methodical, hunt had given her a false sense of how quickly it would react.
She shoved the leaves hard into its camera array, blinding it temporarily. She pushed forward, trying to break loose one of the cameras or push it off-balance.
The thing pivoted on its treads, collapsed the hydraulic pistons in its torso slightly, then slashed upward with one of its blade-arms.
All the leaves were gone, and Gwen was left with a short wooden club.
Her knees shook.
I can make it back into the lower branches if I jump now, she thought.
Before she could escape
, LG 4-201 lunged with its other blade, and Gwen lost her balance as she dodged the attack. She stumbled backward.
I’m dead, she thought. You killed us, Ehrly. You killed your wife, you asshole.
LG 4-201 rolled forward, slowly again, with its blade-arms spread wide to skewer Target M should she roll to either side.
At least Jonas will have the video.
A tiny ball of fur leaped down from one of the low branches behind LG 4-201. Then another. They landed on the thing’s shoulders, fangs bared in feral rage as they tore at the four-camera array.
Gwen had never seen the galagos react violently to anything, but LG 4-201 was the only predator that had ever entered the biosphere. Ehrly’s death had forced them to adapt. Ehrly and Gwen had cared for the bush babies, and so they’d become part of the pack.
The thermals landed at Gwen’s feet as LG 4-201 attempted to slash at its own head. Its creators had apparently not wanted the robot to decapitate itself, because Gwen watched as the galagos continued their violent work inside the mechanical stops of the thing’s blades. It couldn’t touch them.
The secondary cameras flew into the undergrowth as LG 4-201 spun violently, slashing at enemies it could no longer see. Gwen sprinted in a wide circle behind it, heading for the storeroom. She needed something heavier than a tree branch.
The galagos leaped away as soon as Gwen was out of danger, but LG 4-201 still spun and slashed wildly through the undergrowth. Gwen studied the range of its arm movements for several minutes before she ran forward and shoved the thing as hard as she could, toppling it.
As LG 4-201 attempted to right itself with its blade-arms, Gwen brought down a heavy piece of steel pipe on its left elbow, throwing it off-balance again. She moved to the right elbow, then the treads.
Fifteen minutes later, LG 4-201’s power supply lay in the undergrowth next to a spreading pool of hydraulic fluid.
In the starlight, it didn’t look much different from Ehrly’s blood.
Having watched Edward Snowden’s fiasco, Jonas knew better than to hope for an honest hearing from anyone in the United States government. Their only hope, he told Gwen, was to go public—but they could never go home.
They’d released the story through Israeli and British news agencies, in return for a promise of a continuous live broadcast of her lander’s entry and splash in the northeast Atlantic. Intercepting its path with a missile, at that point, would have only earned international bad favor with no reward.
When Jonas watched Gwen being recovered from the icy waters onto a private yacht, he knew he’d assessed their calculus correctly.
No reason to piss everyone off now that it’s out in the open.
He watched with amusement as the BBC’s cameraman zoomed in on the two galagos Gwen had squeezed into the lander with her.
Did we do the right thing, Jonas?” Gwen asked over a live chat. She’d settled in France. She’d asked electronically several times over the intervening months where Jonas was hiding, but he’d never told her.
The color’s gone from her. I guess it bleeds out when you’re second-place to someone who played us both.
“LunarX would have sold you out behind closed doors to keep their NASA contracts,” Jonas said. “Our government would’ve considered you an acceptable loss. Yeah, we did the right thing. Ehrly screwed up, and we did what we had to do to survive.”
Jonas sat on the beach of Pitcairn Island, his money worthless in their barter economy. He closed his laptop, and felt Reiki’s gentle hands on his shoulders. He watched the sunset, regretting only for a moment the fact that everyone on Pitcairn is a Seventh-Day Adventist, and therefore a teetotaler. Can’t spend my loads of money or buy a drink. At least they won’t look for me here, he thought. He looked back at Reiki, and she smiled in the pink twilight.
At least it’s in color.
The Armor Embrace
written by
Doug C. Souza
illustrated by
Christopher Kiklowicz
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Doug C. Souza grew up in a home with a playful love for the arts. His early memories include recording skits on cassette tapes with his brother and sister. That evolved into motion videos using He-Man toys. All the while, his parents sat down and enjoyed every creative endeavor as if it were a night at the movies.
For years, Doug only shared his stories with family. About seven years ago, he ventured out to a local writing group to seek a way to improve his craft (or grasp some understanding of it). He was so nervous about sharing his work that he almost used an alias so he could hightail it outta there if need be.
Sharing his work with others was a huge step in Doug’s writing adventure. There was still plenty to be fixed within his writing, but the fire was sufficiently stoked. (That first group was also where he heard of the Writers of the Future.) To this day, the best advice Doug ever received was to “Read, read, read, and write, write, write.” Well, that and the link to William Shunn’s formatting website.
Doug C. Souza hopes you enjoy his story in the anthology, but if you’re a writer, he hopes you read a couple more and then get back on the crazy train. He lives in Modesto, California with his lovely wife Nicole and their mini-tornado of a daughter. (She’s a mini-tornado in a good way.)
ABOUT THE ILLUSTRATOR
Christopher Kiklowicz was born in 1995 and grew up in Lakewood, California. After his parents took him on a trip to the San Diego Zoo, he fell in love with the animals, especially the tigers and big cats. Christopher felt the need to take them home with him somehow, so he began drawing them almost obsessively.
Later, he found science fiction and superheroes after accidentally seeing the first Spider-Man film. It also led him to gain a strong interest in the comic book industry. After his second year of high school, he began taking classes at the Gnomon School of Visual Effects, where he learned about concept art. He discovered that he did not just want to illustrate or draw, but to tell stories and design worlds. Also, he wanted to bring good messages of love and hope through those stories.
After his high school years, he went on to study illustration entertainment at Laguna College of Art + Design. He has designed characters, written stories, and done world building.
Christopher currently attends Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, where he studies entertainment design and continues to polish his craft and pursue his passion.
The Armor Embrace
My mountainous mech suit isn’t built for subtlety—the steel talons scrape against the sidewalk as I creep up behind Flora.
She whips around so fast her light-brown locks drape her face.
Flora doesn’t scream, just brushes away her hair and gazes at me: a ten-year-old girl facing a ten-foot ’Viathan mech-soldier of the Slayer class.
I had promised myself I’d just watch her for a short spell, you know, to convince myself she’s gonna be okay. Keep the walking tank hidden as she strolled home from school. I imagined her with a group of bubbly friends, chatting about goofy things.
But she was alone. Quiet and alone with her head down. Not the playful Flora I remembered.
After watching her walk by, I reneged on my promise and snuck up behind her—not having any idea what I’d say or do.
A grin spreads across Flora’s face. She’s gazing up at the tinted face shield to the pilot pit as if this is a typical Tuesday afternoon. I know she can’t see past the onyx glass, but it feels like she’s looking into my soul.
“Well, hi, Dad,” she says.
“Hello,” the external speakers crackle in the computerized voice. I want to say her name, but can’t.
Flora inches closer, drops her backpack, and puts a hand on my chromium shin. “It’s just like the pics and vids you sent.” She’s bouncing as she talks. “But way, way bigger. And dirtier.”
“Yes,” the computerized voice ag
rees.
“Where’d you come from?” she asks, glancing past me. “Where were you hiding?”
I raise the mech’s right arm, a massive tungsten and titanium alloy, and motion toward the McMillen’s Airstream camper.
“Oh, okay,” she says with a nod.
I drop a quick link to the local police scanner, waiting for the call to come in. I don’t have much time.
“Some tightwads came by and said you deserted,” Flora says as she flicks some of the dried mud off the outer leg casing. Tightwads? Funny word to describe the Brigade reps. I wonder how much they told her.
“Yes,” the computerized voice answers. Again, I want to say more … to try and explain myself.
“Isn’t that—well, isn’t that like running away?” she asks. Her deep-brown eyes look up. They fill my internal viewscreen. I snap a pic and store it. Only six months have passed, but it seems so much longer. She seems so much older. Every bit as beautiful as I remember.
“Yes,” I have the computerized voice admit. With great caution I move the ’Viathan’s giant hand and extend one of the tentacle-fingers. I gingerly brush the artificial appendage across Flora’s cheek.
Servos within the finger click and whir.
Flora doesn’t flinch. Had she always been so brave?
Sensors send back thermal readings, pulse rate, even perspiration content. It’s not the same as feeling her warmth. Her soft flesh dimpling under my touch.
“You’re workin’ that with your mind, huh?” Flora says. Her tiny voice is rich with curiosity.
I don’t answer.
She tries again: “You know, with the brain wiring stuff you told me about.”
Fragments of a sunny morning: Flora and I were sitting out back, me on the steps, her practicing dribbling a basketball. An older kid at school had told her a rough summation of the cerebral implants and nano-chelated fibers used for motor control within the ’Viathan’s neural interface. “Stabbing wires into the controller’s brain through holes in the skull.” Or something like that. The crass description had frightened her.