SNAFU: Future Warfare

Emeralds Asher Wismer

Ten years. I checked my gun again, remembering the day First Contact had become The Last War. The battlesuit chafed; it wasn't mine, but a spare from storage, unused for years.

“Today's my birthday,” I said to Rico.

“Old lady,” he said. His battlesuit was painted with jagged yellow stripes; he claimed it disoriented the Stalkers, and nobody wanted to argue.

“Hope it won't be your last,” Boss said. As the leader, he wore a battlesuit twice the size of ours. He also carried the Pulse, the only weapon that could take down a Berserker — I'd seen only one in seven years of battle.

Rico handed me a piece of gum. “Happy day,” he said.

Most of the squad sat in silence. There were no fixed units anymore; fewer soldiers every day, going wherever the United Earth sent us. We formed, fought, died, and reformed so many times that it was unusual for even two soldiers to know each other. The only thing we all had in common was our training.

We did the best we could. Every day more of them appeared in the sky. They never tried to talk, just landed and killed.

The chopper rattled. Boss stood and spoke with the pilot, then came back and addressed us.

“This is not a normal mission,” he said. “We are not going out against the Coast ships per our initial orders.”

“We going on vacation?” Rico said.

“The Coast ships are sapping our ability to fight effectively. Too many units are being destroyed while the aliens gain ground. This unit was handpicked. Every soldier in this chopper has more than fifty drops. Between us, we have over seventy million confirmed kills. You individuals don't think of yourselves as special, but believe me, you are all the best in our force.”

I jabbed Rico with my elbow. “Could fool me,” I said. Boss was right, though — this was my fifty-first drop.

“We are taking the Flying City,” Boss said. “Not simply attacking. Today is the day we take control back. All previous missions failed. We no longer have that luxury. If the City is truly their base of operations, we must control or destroy it. UE forces are massed by the Coast, but we have secret forces arrayed around the City. While they keep it occupied, we will go in and take whatever steps are necessary to stay in.”

“Is this a suicide mission?” someone asked.

Boss stared at all of us. “Not if we can help it. Each of your suits has been modified with a data connector, built from wrecked Stalker ships…”

I fired into the mass. Rico had my back, and two others were killing waves of the tiny Stalkers from the left. Boss was at the right, Pulse ready.

“Think that was the last Berserker?” Rico shouted.

“Fuckin' better be,” I said, and fired a grenade to the front. The advancing pile of aliens exploded in a yellow shockwave.

To the left, the Stalkers piled again and had taken one of the guards down. That was how they killed us, as small as they were. Using their own bodies as shields and support, they swarmed and overwhelmed, and they were surprisingly strong.

Boss flicked his lights, and we pushed ahead. The halls of the Flying City vibrated, sometimes from explosions, mostly from whatever ungodly energy kept it alive. A hatch fell and they swarmed Rico; I thrust in, switching gun to knives, and we slashed them apart. Behind us, Boss fired the Pulse.

“Another?” I said.

“Too many little ones,” Boss yelled. “We lost Jensen and Ackles. I collapsed the corridor.”

Rico breathed obscenities as he smeared the Stalkers across the walls, slamming his body against them. Boss joined us and the corridor grew grey with their blood.

The last one had my leg in its teeth. As Rico checked his suit, I pulled it off and held it up. It screamed at me, flailing and ripping at my hand. Singles can't hurt a battlesuit, but they could bring back their friends.

“Lost contact with the unit,” Boss said. “We have to assume we're the last ones.”

“Do we even know where we're going?” Rico said.

“Radar scans show a central area, and electromagnetic scans show a massive power source. Whatever they're doing, it comes from that center.”

“So we find it and blow it up?”

“Command wants us to gather data,” Boss said. “If we can't use it against them….”

The alien latched its teeth into my wrist. I couldn't feel it through the armor.

“Somebody found a little pet,” Rico said.

I squeezed it until its head popped off.

There were more corridors ahead. With Boss on point, I held the rear. Outside, battles were horrifying, the aliens unconstrained and destroying everything in sight. Still, every time they swarmed from the ceiling or floor I had a shock of terror, quickly clamped down by my instincts.

Their skin was blue, rocky, not entirely biological. Scientists suspected they were grown rather than born. Each one transmitted a rough feeling through the sensors in my palms. I'd never seen one without my suit on. I never wanted to.

Another wave, and this time from a side corridor; they filled it with their screaming bodies, swarming over each other as if a single being. Boss raised the Pulse, lowered it; the backwave would kill us.

“Pincer!” I shouted to Boss, and he nodded.

Rico filled the hallway with fire. Our guns are designed for the tiny Stalkers; I pushed forward, vaguely feeling the sting of flechettes on my armor, and then I was in the swarm.

On purpose, this time. The key is don't give them time to get their claws in my joints; I moved without thinking, the blades running down my forearms and shins slicing, a blender of blood and viscera. The martial arts we learned at West Point were worthless here. Fifty drops gave me the skills I needed, each Stalker bursting on my blades as they pushed in.

Even in the face of death, they never back off, never seem to communicate or pass information back. Every swarm attacks exactly as the last. My plan was to pass through the swarm, where I could open fire and we'd whittle it down twice as fast.

I seemed to reach the back of the swarm, it was still moving towards Boss and Rico. Ahead, I saw a cavernous space, lit purple and blue, and something huge, moving, stopping, looking at me.

A Berserker.

As large as Boss's enormous battlesuit, covered in metallic purple skin, with claws and teeth sharper than glass. I'd never seen one up close; the two we'd killed today had ravaged the unit, only the Pulse able to take them out.

My gun wouldn't even scratch it. Instinct took over. I pulled the deadman on my grenade belt, threw it, and pushed back into the swarm. I keyed my emergency power and ran, stomping through the Stalkers. They bit and scratched, but couldn't gain purchase, exploding under my feet and against my helmet. Behind me, a shockwave slammed through the swarm and blew me into the air; I hurtled down and crashed against the opposite wall. Rico and Boss were still there, still fighting.

“The hell happened to you?” Boss shouted.

“Berserker!” I screamed. “We have to go!”

The swarm burst and the Berserker was on us. Boss, his suit keyed to full power, met it head on.

“We have to get to the center!” he shouted. “Go on ahead!”

“You can't kill it without using the Pulse!” Rico said.

“Get through!”

We ran past. Time slowed; Boss had chainsaws built around the suit gloves and each strike drew grey blood. The Berserker had no control; it flailed without strategy, sparks flying as the claws raked. The armor would fall.

Boss spun the monster with a mighty punch, and in the same moment pulled the Pulse from his back and hurled it to me.

“Stay alive!” he shouted, and the Berserker bit down on his arm. Boss locked his joints; his chainsaw hand pushed further down the Berserker's throat, his other hand keeping its claws away.

“We have to save him!”

I grabbed Rico's arm and pulled him away, down the long corridor towards the cavern.

Another shockwave threw us into the air, this time filling our eyes with emerald light.

“Fucking bitch,” Rico said. The cavern was almost empty, a central dome and a few strange structures, and the single large door. For the moment, we were alone.

“There wasn't enough room for the Pulse,” I said. “Boss knew that and so do you. Even if we'd tried to fight with him it would have ripped us apart. Our suits are designed for the little ones.”

“You let him die.”

“He saved us with the Pulse bomb in his suit.”

“For what? There's nothing here!”

I looked around. It was quiet. Noise vibrating through the City told me the battle outside raged on.

“Maybe Boss scared them off with the explosion,” Rico said. He held by the door. “You remember the way out?”

“There's a shaft above, past that grate and shielded from the outside. Boss said our suits could climb it if we can get through.”

“So,” Rico said. “We made it. Do that data thing and let's jet.”

The central dome, glowing purple, had screens, keypads, and a data port. The cable on my suit led to a storage drive, reverse-engineered from Stalker ships. I plugged it in and the firmware automatically started downloading.

“Any day now,” Rico said. “I can hear noises from the corridor.”

Stalker language could not be translated, at least not yet. I examined the keypads and pushed a few buttons. Some of the screens lit up, but I couldn't understand the writing or even the layout.

“Come on!”

My suit pinged. It was full.

“Your turn,” I said, walking to the door.

“No way. We need to get out of here.”

“Rico,” I said. “Get the data.”

He glared, but walked to the dome and plugged in. I hefted the Pulse and checked my power. A blast from the Pulse would knock me over if I wasn't ready.

I heard chittering gibberish from the corridor. Down where Boss had died, shadows and echoes headed our way.

“Rico! Grenades!”

He tossed his grenade belt to me. I loaded my gun and waited.

The first Stalkers came round the corner. They were just walking, moving in that awful stop-motion, and then one saw me and screamed. Instantly the corridor filled. The grenade coated the walls with gray blood then I sprayed the corridor with bullets. They swarmed and I cut them down. So many this time. Millions, perhaps. There was no way to count them, and as the corridor filled with their bodies Rico joined me.

“What now?”

I pointed. “Up!” We backed away. Even by myself I might have held the corridor, controlled sweeps mowing the Stalkers down in a confined space, but as soon as they reached the door they swarmed up and around the walls, surrounding us. I fired a hook up to the grate, and it popped off, shattering Stalker bodies. Rico appeared at my side, helped me up, and together we fought them off, head and torsos flying, grey blood spattering.

As the swarm lessened, I let Rico hold them off while I rewound my winch. When I got to my feet, a Berserker appeared in the doorway and roared. I swung the Pulse from my back and fired. The emerald ball annihilated the Berserker where it stood, smashing the walls and flinging us back. Most of the Stalkers were dead.

Another roar from the corridor, and another. I fired my hook up and it stuck to the shaft wall.

“Rico!”

He grabbed me around the shoulders and waist, and I hit the winch. A Berserker, larger than the others, ran into the room and leaped. Its claws sank into Rico's leg and he screamed. The winch groaned.

I knew it wouldn't hold. Rico's eyes met mine, and he let me go at the same time as I grabbed his hook, fired it, then fired a grenade from my gun directly down into the Berserker's face. It let go, and we swung free.

Dazed, the Berserker staggered to its feet. I hit buttons on the Pulse, dropped it.

“What are you doing?” Rico screamed.

“Up,” I shouted at him. “Now! As far as we can!”

We rose. The Berserker leaped again, but missed, and then we were in the shaft and rising. When we reached our hooks, I grabbed Rico's wrist and pointed.

“Up!”

He unhooked, fired, and held me while I did the same. We rose.

An unholy explosion, larger than the grenade belt or Boss's Pulse bomb, rocked the City. It rose up the shaft, the green light overloading my helmet. I punched one hand into the wall of the shaft and held on as the shockwave ripped at my body. I couldn't see anything.

Finally, the sound and fury dimmed. My helmet switched back on.

“You bitch,” Rico said. His voice sounded like a smile.

“Whatever it takes,” I said. “We promised Boss.”