exoskeletal help from the nanites to move under normal gravity. Naturally, as my marines were anything but average men, they could perform even without this power-assist, but I gave them everything I could. The helmet was hard polymers, as was the chest and limb covering pieces. These harder, thicker surfaces made the suit heavy, but that didn’t matter much in space with nanotized troops. Light hits from shrapnel and the like couldn’t penetrate the new battle suit.
I decided to have each man be responsible for transferring the existing HUD unit inside his current headpiece into the new suits. That way, I didn’t have to duplicate all that delicate electronics. The power packs and weapons systems remained similarly untouched. I was focused on the skin of the suit and how it reacted to damage.
I built the suit in regions, with separate compartments for your limbs, torso and head. There were seals that felt like pinching elastic at each of the critical junctures. With some fast acting sensors, I was able to build the suit so it would clamp down on any region that was compromised. For example, if a marine was hit in the leg, in a split-second the suit would close that section off so the rest of the suit didn’t lose pressure. When the nanites managed to repair the breach, the region could be repressurized.
When it was done, I tested it myself first. The inside of the suit was stiff and somewhat uncomfortable. It smelled harshly of plastic and artificial materials. I was certain that in all history, no fighter had ever enjoyed donning his armor. Still, if it saved your life, you learned to love it.
My first test consisted of detonating a grenade while my chest piece rested on it. This was not as easy to do as it sounds. I lay there, on top of the grenade, for sometime before finally lighting it off. I was reminded of being a kid on the high dive for the first time, looking down at cold blue water. Theoretically, I should survive this-but I wasn’t completely sure. I finally took the plunge and the world bucked beneath me, throwing me against the ceiling. I bounced from there and drifted back down.
Afterward, I check the suit carefully. There was an impressive blast mark and some pitted spots in the chest region, but it had worked. I couldn’t think of a way to test the regional cut-off clamps without doing myself significant harm, so I figured real combat would prove or disprove my theories in that direction. I ordered several factories to churn these out. We should have a good number of them before we went into battle again.
I took out another grenade from the ammo box and rolled it around in my gauntleted fingers, testing my manual dexterity. The suit made my hands move stiffly, there was no question of that. But I thought that a bridge officer could still work a screen with these gauntlets on. Again, it wasn’t preferable, but it was workable.
I headed back to my quarters, exhausted. Sandra appeared to be asleep, so I slipped quietly into bed with her. I sighed and stretched out happily, more than ready for the last sleep I expected to get before things got crazy.
Sandra surprised me, however. She woke up and came after me with sudden determination. Maybe it was the nearness of combat. The love-making was intense, desperate and almost painful. The ending for both of us was more of a tension-release than a blissful pleasure.
Still, like most guys, I was happy to take what I could get.
4
I was asleep when the Macros decided they’d waited long enough. What had it been? Less than three days, I figured. A little over sixty hours. Perhaps on their calendar a full day or a full week had passed. Who knew what equated to a day/night cycle for the Macros? I had no idea how they measured time, or if they measured it in consistent units at all.
Major Sarin’s voice woke me up and a moment later the sirens sounded and yellow flashers started whirling. I couldn’t make out Sarin’s words, but I caught the tone: she was scared.
I bounced out of bed, literally. Having a nanite-enhanced body and minimal gravity I touched the ceiling before I touched the floor.
I knew why the klaxons were sounding, we were underway. I could have used more time, several weeks in fact. But for unknown reasons, Macro Command figured they had given us long enough to reconfigure our forces. They had never asked me how long I wanted. They had never asked anyone anything ever, as far as I could tell. They didn’t like questions from us either, they only responded to demands.
Sandra had been in bed with me, but she was missing when I woke up. She stepped out of the shower unit naked and dripping. Her legs were long and tan. Runnels of water trickled down her calves. She hadn’t bothered with the dry cycle on the shower unit, and had just popped the exit button.
“Is this it?” she asked.
I nodded. “Sounds like it. I can feel the ship’s attitude jets firing.”
We pulled on our suits without bothering to adjust them. We left the flaps open, knowing the nanite-chains impregnated in our reactive suits would figure out we weren’t closing them ourselves and seal the flaps after a while. Sometimes it was annoying when they insisted on rearranging your outfit, but they usually guessed right.
Still carrying our boots, we rushed out through the bulkhead of our shared quarters into the narrow hallway. We moved quickly to the other end of the command brick and joined Sarin at the big screen. Gorski came in a few minutes later. His eyes were wide. Everyone looked nervous, and everyone knew we were nowhere near ready for this.
“Sandra, connect me with Macro Command,” I said.
Sandra had spent the last few days familiarizing herself with the bigger, more complex com-board in the command brick. She’s picked it up quickly, as it was essentially the same system as the private unit I had in my office. In the old days, however, she’d only handled my personal and political communications. Now, she was responsible for relaying commands to people who might die if she screwed up. I could see she was taking the job seriously. She had that fixed, focused expression on her face I’d come to recognize in my crew.
The connection was up in seconds. I didn’t bother to praise her now, however. This was strictly business.
“Macro Command,” I said. “This is Kyle Riggs. I require an update on our mission status.”
“Mission is active.”
“Give me the estimated timing for contact with the enemy.”
“Four hours, fifty-eight minutes.”
“Give me the estimated timing for our assault operation.”
“Assault operation will commence in four hours, fifty-eight minutes.”
I nodded and pursed my lips. Not much information there. Either we did not quite understand each other, or our assault was to begin immediately when we got into range with the enemy. Either way, we had less than five hours before things became serious.
“Sir,” Major Sarin said, gesturing toward the screen.
I eyed it. The donut-shaped ring loomed close. We’d been parked in orbit nearby for a day or two, but now the ships were nosing into the ring. Once we passed through it, we would be transported to another star system. As far as we’d been able to determine, such transportation was instantaneous.
“Everyone brace for impact,” I said. “Remember the mines we hit the last time we entered a system, people. We don’t know what we are walking into.”
Sandra hesitated a second, staring at the screen. I glowered at her until she remembered her job and relayed the order to everyone. Almost immediately, nanite arms reached down from the ceiling and grabbed each of us by the hooks that ringed our belts. More arms looped down and attached loosely to our wrists and ankles. All over the base, anyone who was not strapped and clamped to something solid made sure they were.
The two Macro ships slid up close to the giant ring on the screen. The cruiser slipped through first and vanished. My guts clenched into a ball, and our invasion ship followed the cruiser.
There was a shudder as we went through. I knew the feeling well by now. We had been transported to… somewhere else. To another star system. I once again wondered who had built these rings, these gateways that linked the stars. I knew the Macros hadn’t built them, even if they seemed adept at their use. Some other race had to have built much of the technology everyone seemed to be using: the rings, the factories that duplicated
