Vaughn Heppner: Star Fortress

It drifted at far orbit, having sailed through the void on built-up velocity and braking with low-signature thrusters. Its design and tactical application was predicated on proven cyborg superiority. It was a troop ship: stealthily approaching the target in order to insert cyborgs and capture it. The Web-Mind in charge of operations presently ran through options as it computed known data on the Red Planet.

The missile launched from Station Santa Anna told it much about the defensive satellites ringing Mars. It was surprised the stealth-capsule had reached the surface at all. Martian defenses were much weaker than it had anticipated. Yes, the Web-Mind now knew how the Homo sapiens communicated with each other, how they reacted to an insertion invasion and the location of their primary defensive stations. Conquest of Mars…there was a sixty-two percent probability of victory.

Eighteen minutes after the analysis, the Web-Mind pulsed orders: Load five stealth-capsules with soldiers and the sixth with a converter unit . Once launched, it would fire three black-ice pods, one for each of the key satellites. It would hold five other stealth-capsules in reserve and the second converter as it continued its cloaked orbit.

The Mars Assault would be run along different parameters than any of the former campaigns. That would confuse the Homo sapiens, who reacted predictably and would expect similar moves from their opponent.

As the Web-Mind reconfigured the optimal strategy, the Lurker’s rail-gun ejected the first stealth-capsule at the distant Red Planet. It would take the capsules eight weeks to reach an insertion orbit. By then, the Homo sapiens would begin to relax, expecting that the worst was over.

Three days after killing the cyborg, Captain Sandoval hung onto the insides of a shaking Comet 9 strike-jet. After the sandstorm fight, he had been badly injured and was now on a ton of painkillers and half out of his mind.

The strike-jet was an old military plane, a two-seater, having survived countless hits and patch-jobs. Ricardo had already endured hours in it and now found himself on the other side of Mars.

Below, red dust-clouds billowed across the surface. It was a global storm, covering most of the planet. Although Mars was smaller than Earth, its landmass was a little more than all Earth’s continents combined. The surface of Mars consisted of a worldwide desert. As dust entered the atmosphere, sunlight heated it, increasing the temperature, sometimes as much as thirty degrees Centigrade. That caused winds to rush to colder areas, picking up yet more dust and adding to the situation. On Earth, water vapor was the main heating agent instead of dust. And on Earth, deserts were limited in area and therefore unable to feed a global storm. Dust clouds often grew in the Gobi desert of Mongolia Sector, for instance, but when they blew over the Pacific Ocean, the storm soon died from the lack of new fueling dust.

Looking down through the billowing iron-oxide particles, Ricardo spied volcanoes and deep valleys.

“Hang on,” the pilot said. “It will get rough for a few minutes.”

As the plane blanked, it shivered hard into the wind. Something metal dislodged from the console in front of Ricardo. The part struck his foot, and sparks shot from the console.

“There’s an extinguisher to your left!” the pilot shouted.

“What?” Ricardo shouted back.

The sparks caught fire, and a burnt electrical smell assaulted Ricardo’s nose. The flames before him flickered with bitter purpose. To add injury to the emergency, the rattling and shaking around him increased.

“Put out the fire, amigo!” the pilot shouted. “Do it before it shorts something important and we crash.”

The words finally penetrated Ricardo’s hazy thoughts. He spotted the extinguisher, tore it from the holder and studied it for a half-second. The burnt electrical smell was worse now and the flames bigger. He aimed the nozzle at the flames and pressed the switch. Foam hissed, coating the console. Some of it sprayed back onto Ricardo. A fleck landed on his lips. It tasted awful. He leaned forward in his seat, pulling against the restraints and pressed the button again, putting out the electrical fire.

By this time, the jet plunged out of the bottom of the dust storm and entered one of the long Martian valleys that crisscrossed the planet. The shaking and rattling quit. Now Ricardo heard the laboring jet engine. At the same time, he noticed the sharp decrease of illumination. They were at the bottom of the dust cloud and had huge canyon walls on either side of them. He glanced right and left, and estimated each wall as about a kilometer away.

“Where are we?” Ricardo shouted.

“We’re nearing Salvador Dome, amigo.”

Ricardo blinked several times, until he grew aware of the extinguisher in his hands. He shoved it back into its holder so it the locks snapped.

Like this jet, just about everything was old and aging on Mars. Ricardo wouldn’t have been surprised if the extinguisher had lacked foam. Salvador Dome was a grim reminder of the luck and disrepair here.

After the Third Battle for Mars, everyone had died in the dome. Against odds, a boulder-sized piece of Phobos had flashed into the valley, streaked the half kilometer to the bottom and shattered the main structure. The moon-meteor had proceeded to smash through every level of Salvador Dome. No one survived the impact. To save time and effort—critical commodities on Mars—workers had dumped the corpses down the meteor-made hole. It was a sealed mass grave now and a ghost-haunted dome.

Why take me halfway across the planet to bring me here? It made no sense in terms of jet-fuel and use of the aging Comet 9.

The pilot’s radio crackled into life. “You have ten seconds to identify yourself,” a female operator told them.

Ricardo frowned. Ten seconds? That would imply a military capacity to do something about non-compliance. That made even less sense. Large-scale defensive equipment was among the rarest of commodities on Mars. Why station anti-air missiles down here at a dead dome?

A constant whine sounded from the pilot’s console.

“Ground control has lock-on,” the pilot informed Ricardo. “I guess I’d better answer.” The pilot clicked a switch, saying, “This is an Omi Operational flight.”

Omi? That was the name of Marten Kluge’s best friend. That couldn’t be a coincidence, could it?

“I’m bringing Captain Ricardo Sandoval to the site,” the pilot said. “Those are per the orders of Secretary-General Gomez.”

Ricardo looked up in wonder. No one had said anything about the Secretary-General. “What’s going on?” he asked.

“You have permission to land,” the operator said. “But if you deviate from the flight corridor, you will be targeted and shot down.”

“They want us to feel welcome,” the pilot said over his shoulder.

“Salvador Dome is defended?” Ricardo asked.

The pilot laughed. “They’re targeting us with Veracruz SAMs.”

Ricardo knew those were the highest-grade Surface to Air Missiles the Mars Planetary Union possessed. What he couldn’t fathom is why they ringed Salvador Dome, a dead city.

“Do you know what’s going on?” Ricardo asked.

“Yes I do, amigo. The SAMs have lock-on and the operator means exactly what she says. We stay in the flight corridor all the way down. With your permission, Captain, I will concentrate on that.”

“Yes, please do,” Ricardo said. He leaned near the canopy as the jet banked slightly. Below was a great dome, with a jagged hole to the left of center. He spied the SAM sites flanking the dark dome. What did they guard down there? He supposed he would find out soon enough.