Combat Frame XSeed Read online

  “They’re Grentos modified for marine use,” Max chimed in. “Seed Corp calls them Mablungs. They’re probably packing heat swords and handheld railguns.”

  “Collins, pull out,” Larson ordered. “Darving, get your ass back here and help me sink these bastards.”

  A burst of 115mm shells cut spiral trails through the water as Larson opened fire on the Mablung approaching to Ritter’s right. Three rounds punched gaping holes in the marine CF’s torso, and it exploded in a flashing cluster of bubbles. The center Mablung raised its railgun’s rectangular barrel and returned fire. The machine gun volley ceased.

  “Colonel!” Ritter called over the comm. “Are you hit?”

  Ritter’s own problems interrupted before he got an answer. The third Mablung kept charging him, firing as it advanced. Turning his CF underwater was like dancing while drunk. Two railgun darts hammered into the Grenzie, shredding its right shoulder pauldron and left skirt armor, before Ritter faced his opponent.

  The Mablung had already entered close combat range. It drew a spade-shaped short sword, and bubbles streamed from the superheated blade. Ritter leveled his machine gun, but only water spurted from the barrel before the Mablung’s blade sliced the gun in half. In desperation, Ritter dropped his useless weapon and grabbed his opponent’s descending arm, stopping the fizzing blade less than a meter from his Grenzie’s head.

  Red lights strobed in Ritter’s cockpit. Text flashing on his screen warned him that ambient pressure levels were exceeding the Grenzie’s design tolerances. Unless he ascended soon, his CF would be crushed like a soda can.

  The Mablung’s pilot clearly didn’t have the same problem. He holstered his railgun on his CF’s back, gripped his sword in both hands, and doubled his effort to split the Grenzie’s head. With his right shoulder servos damaged, the reduced strength of both his CF’s hands couldn’t keep the superheated blade from descending closer.

  Chatter from Ritter’s teammates flooded the comm, shouting that they were taking fire from the first Mablung and urging him to disengage so they’d have a clear shot at the second. They didn’t see that clinging to his enemy was all that spared Ritter from a crushing death in the black ocean depths.

  Which gave him an idea.

  Ritter pulled the Mablung in closer, letting the sword bite into his CF’s already damaged shoulder and locking the aquatic CF in a bear hug. He flipped open the clear plastic cover of the jump jet ignition switch on top of his control stick and whispered a prayer. “Please let this work!”

  Had the Grenzie’s jump boosters been airbreathing jets, Ritter would have been screwed. Luckily, they were in fact chemical rockets. He set the thrusters to full burn and pressed the ignition. Much like his machine gun, the rocket nozzles discharged pressurized jets of water. The Grenzie rose slightly. A massive blast followed that propelled Ritter’s CF upward like a bullet, taking the Mablung along for the ride.

  The grappled combat frames broke the surface in a fifty meter geyser of seawater. Ritter kept the throttle mashed down, sending them rocketing into the sky.

  “What the hell is that?” Max called over the comm.

  “That would be Ritter,” said Larson. “He did something incredibly stupid, and you’re just in time to watch it kill him.”

  Ritter’s secondary cameras showed Collins’ retreating helo trailing black smoke. Larson’s Grento bobbed and weaved, staying one step ahead of the railgun darts lancing upward from the sea while he returned fire. “It’s too deep for standard rounds,” grumbled Larson.

  A point of light gleamed on the horizon and soon resolved into the sharp, angular fuselage of the Thor Prototype. “Ritter might be reckless,” said Max, “but he gave me a clear shot at that Mab. Marilyn, charge up Mjolnir and give me a firing solution.”

  The jet’s chin-mounted, lens-like barrel angled toward the sea. A blinding column of light stabbed into the water, flash-boiling millions of liters into a billowing white cloud. A second explosion far below sent another plume of water and steam fountaining to the surface.

  “Target is tango uniform,” Max declared. “Nice work, honey.”

  “You can sweet talk your calculator when all hostiles are tits up,” said Larson. “Right now, the last one’s tangling with Ritter at two thousand feet.”

  Larson’s words barely registered with Ritter, whose attention was focused on his losing battle with the heat sword-wielding Mab. The Grenzie’s waterlogged arm servos squealed as its left hand, which gripped the Mab’s right wrist, was forced down by both of the marine CF’s arms. An actuator in the Grenzie’s elbow blew with a puff of black smoke, and the shimmering blade collided with Ritter’s sensor dome. His main screen went black.

  While he was pulling up feeds from secondary cameras installed throughout the Grenzmark’s body, the jump jets stalled. The sickening sensation of weightlessness intruded once again on Ritter’s panic.

  Plaintive alarms warned of the Grenzie’s imminent impact with the water’s surface. This time, there would be no escape from the smothering depths.

  Ritter unstrapped himself, drew his sidearm, and opened his cockpit. Howling, salt-scented winds strove to tear him from his seat. The Mab’s cerulean blue chest blocked his view of the ocean rising rapidly to meet them. Max said that Mabs are modified Grentos. Hope they didn’t change the emergency release!

  Ritter reached across the screaming gulf between the entangled CFs. Fighting the wind resistance was like forcing his hand through a block of gelatin. With a final push, he grabbed the central bar traversing the circular access handle on the Mab’s cockpit. His aching fingers twisted the slick handle twice to the right and once to the left.

  The hatch retracted, revealing a wetsuited pilot whose eyes widened behind his diving helmet’s goggles. The whipping wind threw off Ritter’s aim, and he shot the Soc in the hip instead of the chest. But Ritter got the opening he needed to release the pilot’s harness and yank him out of the cockpit. Furious air currents blew the Soc away from the grappled CFs and into the open sky.

  Dragging himself from his crippled Grenzie and into the Mab’s cockpit took most of Ritter’s strength and all his luck. He threw himself into the pilot’s seat and sealed the hatch. The Mab hit the water before he could strap himself in.

  9

  Max banked north around the rising vapor cloud he’d made of the Mablung and the surrounding water. He lost sight of Ritter’s Grenzie and the Mab it was grappling in the rising cloud but kept tabs on the battle via his comm. That kid’s a wild man, he thought. He hoped Griff was wrong about Ritter getting himself killed.

  The howl of the wind, followed by a gunshot, came over the comm. A moment later, the Grenzie’s channel went dead.

  “Ritter,” Max belted into his headset. “Do you copy? What is your status? Over.”

  No reply came.

  “You’re wasting your breath, Captain,” Larson said. “The Mab decapitated Ritter’s Grenzie, and they both hit the water.”

  “We have to pull him out of there!” said Max. “If the Mab doesn’t get him, the pressure will.”

  “Negative,” said Griff, his voice heavy with resignation. “I’ve got just enough fuel to coast home on fumes. Collins already turned back. I’m scrubbing the mission. Return to base.”

  “Look,” said Max, “I’m looping back around, anyway. Let me make one more pass over the splashdown zone.”

  “You are to proceed back to the Yamamoto ASAP,” Griff insisted. “Do you read me?”

  “I helped get the kid into this,” said Max. “Let me make one more pass. I owe him that much.”

  “One more pass,” said Griff. “Then you get your ass back to base, no matter what. If you find Ritter, radio ahead, and we’ll dispatch a rescue team. No lone wolf stuff. Are we clear?”

  “We’re clear, sir.” Max ended his transmission and toggled Marilyn’s verbal interface back on.

  “Hello, Max,” the A.I.’s dulcet but somewhat tinny voice greeted him. “Current air temperature is tw
enty-seven degrees centigrade. Humidity sixty percent. Wind speed is eight knots from the southwest. Visibility is forty kilometers. All in all, excellent flying weather.”

  “That’s great, honey. We’re gonna be doing a flyby ocean scan. I need you to calibrate all sensors for maximum depth. Can you do that for me?”

  “Of course,” Marilyn said through his headphones, though it sounded as if she were sitting right next to him. “Sensors calibrated.”

  “That’s my girl. Now keep an eye out for a sunken Grenzmark C. We’ve only got one shot at this.”

  Light g-forces pushed Max back in his seat as he completed the turn and leveled out his jet’s flight path. His eyes searched the sparkling blue water through the wedge-shaped canopy. The vapor cloud had dissipated, leaving the ocean’s surface calm and glassy.

  “Metallic object located at a depth of four hundred meters,” Marilyn said. “Its configuration matches that of a standard CF-05 Grenzmark C.”

  “What’s the Grenzie’s status?”

  Marilyn paused. “Inoperative,” she said at last.

  Max slammed his gloved fist down on his armrest. “Damn it! I should have listened to Griff. This is my fault.”

  “Combat frame detected five kilometers to the southwest traveling away from our position at forty knots. Model confirmed as CFM-07 Mablung.”

  “It’s the bastard that deep-sixed Ritter. Plot an intercept course, sweetheart. We’re going dynamite fishing.”

  The Mab appeared as a moving red dot on Max’s HUD. He pointed the Thor Prototype’s nose downward and opened the throttle. The jet’s afterburners roared, and sheer-sided islands rushed past the canopy. The long gray hull of the Yamamoto rose into view from beyond the ocean horizon, with smaller vessels in-between. The dot was a klick away and headed straight for the carrier.

  Max eased back on the throttle. “Attention, Coalition combat frame,” he barked into his headset. “You are trespassing in EGE waters. Reverse course now, or you will be fired upon.”

  The Mab only accelerated.

  “Marilyn, call the Yamamoto and tell them they’ve got incoming. I’ll try to catch this Soc before he gets in firing range of the ship.”

  The water column between the Mab and the Thor Prototype interfered with the jet’s fire control, and Max strained to keep his targeting reticle centered on the red dot. Firing Mjolnir was too risky with the Yamamoto as a backstop, so he pressed the release for his Vulcan cannons and covered the trigger.

  “The Yamamoto acknowledges the warning, Max” said Marilyn. “One of her escorts has a bead on the Mablung and is prepared to blow it out of the water.”

  Max smiled behind his mask. “It’s my job to make sure they don’t have to.” He squeezed the trigger. A double row of small geysers erupted across the ocean’s surface toward the submerged CF.

  “No damage,” Marilyn said. “Standard ammunition is ineffective at that depth.”

  The negative number representing the Mab’s depth rapidly dwindled. “Looks like the Soc pilot’s solving that problem for us,” said Max. “Is he an idiot?”

  “Target within effective weapon range,” said Marilyn.

  Max covered the trigger but held his fire. “He could’ve tagged us anytime with that railgun. Something doesn’t add up.”

  “One of the Yamamoto’s escort cruisers is preparing to launch an anti-submarine missile,” Marilyn warned. “They advise us to clear the area.”

  The Mab surfaced. It bobbed in the water like a blue giant. The cockpit opened, and a tiny figure emerged, waving his arms.

  “Marilyn, zoom in on the Soc pilot,” said Max. The magnified screen showed a clear close-up of Ritter’s dark hair and eyes.

  A ball of light shot up from the distant cruiser’s armored superstructure, trailing a column of smoke. “Missile inbound,” Marilyn said. “It has a lock on the Mablung.”

  “Shit!” said Max. He centered his reticle on the rising fireball and opened fire. The missile’s countermeasures kept him from locking on, and the Vulcans sprayed bullets into the missile’s exhaust trail. Max struggled to reacquire his target as the missile reached the top of its arc and plummeted toward the sea. If its homing torpedo payload hit the water, there’d be nothing to do but watch Ritter die.

  Lightning flashed from beneath the jet’s nose, and the missile detonated less than fifty meters above the waterline. The blast kicked up concentric rings of waves that nearly sent Ritter tumbling out of the Mab’s cockpit and buffeted the Thor Prototype as it passed overhead.

  Shock and relief warred for supremacy in Max’s brain. “Marilyn, did you fire Mjolnir without my authorization?”

  “Yes,” the A.I. said. “Voice stress analysis clearly showed that you prioritized Private Ritter’s life over all other concerns. The missile was 1.2 seconds from impact, but it would have taken at least 2.6 seconds for me to request and receive firing clearance.”

  Max blew out a deep breath. “We’ll have a talk about that later. For now, tell the carrier to hold their fire and inform them that Private Ritter is in command of the enemy CF.”

  “Yes, Max.”

  “And honey? Nice shooting.”

  10

  “What is a Soc’s favorite drink?” the barge pilot asked in her precise, tinny voice.

  Zane’s head tilted back against the wheelhouse’s steel wall with a soft thud. “I don’t know.”

  “A Dirty Russian on the rocks.”

  “I don’t get it,” said Zane.

  “The joke refers to the five hundred cubic meter ice block dropped on Siberia from the SOC’s lunar mass driver in 2228.”

  “Oh.” Zane squeezed his eyes shut and sighed. Most of the pilot’s jokes went over his head, and after a week spent drifting downriver with no other entertainment options, he was getting tired of humoring her.

  “I’m detecting exasperation in your voice. Would you prefer a trivia challenge or a riddle contest?”

  Zane stood, crossed to the swivel-mounted touchscreen in two strides, and set the A.I. pilot’s audio to “do not disturb” mode. This wasn’t what I expected when Browning called our pilot Norma.

  The Noetic Operations Route Management Application had steered them safely down the Mississippi all the way from Chicago, but her grating personality left much to be desired. Zane decided to complain to NORMA’s programmer if they ever met.

  Screw that. When I get Dead Drop back, I can flatten Seed Corp.

  “Come look at this!” Dorothy called from outside. Zane opened the creaking watertight hatch. Stepping from the cramped wheelhouse to the barge’s deck was like escaping from an old rusty vault and walking face-first into a hot damp towel. The heavy air smelled of brackish water, and shrill bird calls filled the sky.

  Dorothy stood at the bow in the tan, short-sleeved blouse and denim shorts she’d grabbed from her work locker before they’d left Chicago. She clutched a box of energy bars from the boat’s cargo—Seed Corp still had their fingers in the food industry—and stared into the distance.

  Zane approached to stand behind her. A wide stretch of muddy water spanned from the barge’s bow to the horizon. On the right, a bracket-shaped gray and silver flood wall carved out a dismal tract of marshland from the river. To the left, the crumbling walls of city blocks long since reclaimed by the river sprawled as far as Zane could see.

  This grim view earned short shrift from Zane, who chalked it up to Earth’s lack of weather control. The dun-colored towers looming around the river’s next bend captured his attention. Unlike the drowned remnants of a once-great empire that surrounded him, the distant city still breathed.

  “You ever been here before?” asked Zane.

  “The Socs treat their grounder populations like indentured servants,” said Dorothy. “You need a transit pass to leave your district, and they almost never approve travel to the free cities.”

  Zane clenched his teeth. “How are we gonna find this Jean-Claude guy?”

  Dorothy clasped his arm. “Browning
said he’d be easy to find. Have a little faith.”

  “I don’t have much choice,” said Zane.

  Dorothy’s faith was rewarded when NORMA docked the barge at a pier of new, white concrete, and a bald stout man exited a black luxury sedan parked beside the levee above. He wore a seersucker suit the color of sugary milk over a black shirt. The left lens of his round glasses was blacked out. “M. Dellister,” he called down to the barge in a robust baritone, “Mlle Wheeler, welcome to New Orleans!”

  Zane marched up the steel steps built into the levee and stood beside the car. Dorothy followed.

  “Who are you?” Zane asked the one-eyed man. “How do you know our names?”

  The stranger’s mouth curled into a smile under his brown mustache. “I am Fr. Edward Cleon, confessor to His Royal Highness Jean-Claude du Lione. Dr. Browning informed us of your imminent arrival through our back channel contacts.”

  “Jean-Claude is royalty?” interjected Dorothy.

  “His Highness is the last heir to the throne of Nouvelle-France,” said Fr. Cleon. He opened the car’s back door and motioned the new arrivals inside. “The Dauphin waits to receive you.”

  Zane reluctantly got in the car. Dorothy eagerly joined him. The leather-trimmed interior felt refreshingly cool compared to the muggy air outside. A hulking man with mocha skin dressed in a black business suit sat behind the wheel. Fr. Cleon took the seat beside the driver, who pulled away from the dock as soon as the priest’s door closed.

  The car sped down a straight road bounded by a high wall on the right and rows of rundown warehouses on the left. After a few blocks, the driver turned left onto a narrow street lined with small boxlike houses.

  “What’s a French prince doing in America?” Dorothy asked at length. “And what’s his connection to Dr. Browning?”

  The burly driver answered in a rumbling Midwestern accent. “The Dauphin’s family has owned property in New Orleans for years. He fled here when the Socs’ Caliphate thugs overran his kingdom and murdered his parents. Don’t bring it up again.”