Red Eden: Homeworld Bound | Chapter 9: Sons of Mars
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Chapter 9: Sons of Mars
As the APC rocked over rough terrain, Jack, with his hands cuffed behind him, sang a forlorn tune to match his forlorn mood. “All my ex's live in Tharsis... And that's why I hang my hat in Huoxing City...”
The APC came to hard stop.
The rear hatch flung open. “Martians, out.”
Jack stood up but remained half-crouched as he couldn't stand to his full Martian height in this cramped space. He hopped off the rear bumper and took in the scenery. They were at the foot of a mountain overlooking a fjord. There was a town by the coast with a huge cruise ship docked at the port. Hundreds of Viking-esque sailboats had taken shelter inside the calm waters of the fjord. Thousands of people milled about inside a tent-city which they had erected in and around the town. Pillars of black smoke rose from various campfires as puffins circled overhead, squawking angrily at the uninvited guests.
On the opposite side of the fjord, Jack saw a curious sight. An army of fur-clad Viking-esque warriors stood in formation along a road leading to a tunnel inside a mountain. Seconds later, a column of black armoured vehicles rolled out of the tunnel. The warriors thrust their spears and axes into the air with a triumphant roar. Jack tried counting the APCs, but he quickly lost track. There were simply too many. As if to hammer home just how screwed the Martians were, a V-formation of VTOLs passed over the mountain, their electric turbines screeching like angry banshees.
“Erwin,” Derek said, “I thought you were a gun-nut, but you were right to bring Big Bertha.”
“I wanted to bring Fat Fanny,” Erwin grumbled, “but no, Solar Express refuses to carry explosive munitions.”
Jack shook his head despairingly.
“Off the road!”
Jack and companions received a hard shove from their handlers. The soldiers stood off the road, which led into a tunnel inside a mountain. A low rumble came from within, followed by the roar of a large host of troops. Next came the rhythmic crunch of marching boots. Out of the darkness, an army of clone soldiers emerged, all dressed in black. The soldiers marched in a tight formation, the robotic swing of their arms and the rhythmic clack of their boots timed to perfect unison. The foremost soldier carried a red flag bearing the emblem of a black tree whose tangled roots and branches twisted to form a wreath. That ungodly emblem screamed 'we are the army of evil', though Jack must admit it looked badass.
Before long, the soldiers formed a column spanning several hundred metres. The road they followed merged with the only road leading out of the fjord. There, the soldiers lined up in formation next to the column of idling APCs. It was clear to Jack that Gabriella was mobilizing for war.
He licked his parched lips, his tongue feeling like sandpaper. He hoped Ellen was seeing all this, and he hoped she had a plan because he certainly didn't see how they could possibly win this war. He wondered just how extensive Gabriella's underground network must be to hide an entire army for over a century without a single Martian satellite picking up on their activity.
One of the soldiers, the one who wielded the big gun, looked at Jack with a smirk. “Mother plays her cards. Now Martians play yours.”
Perhaps the only smart move was to fold, but Jack wasn't going to admit that to the enemy.
Erwin growled at the soldier. The soldier patted his big gun affectionately. Jack should have realized sooner that the big gun was none other than Big Bertha.
“Get moving,” the soldier said.
The clone soldiers ushered Jack and his companions into the tunnel. They walked past a blast door that had a man-sized sheet of metal welded to it, presumably to cover up a hole. They passed a second blast door. This one definitely had a man-sized hole carved through it, and judging by the scorch marks, the carving was done by lasers.
The soldiers escorted Jack and his companions into a lobby where they took an elevator down three levels. When the door slid open, Jack stared down an aisle flanked by black pods. A yellowish glow emanated from the glass covering each pod. A hundred metres from the elevator, a golden arch opened to another part of the chamber.
“March straight ahead,” the soldier said.
Jack put one boot onto the black glaze that covered the floor. Starlight twinkled around his boot. He looked up and saw twinkling starlight arranged in a crisscross pattern across the cavern's black dome. This was the perfect venue to hold a rave, and Jack was definitely going to party here as soon as Gabriella was dispensed with. But that was fantasy, and reality was looking quite grim for him and his people.
The soldiers escorted him and his companions down the aisle, their footsteps echoing off the cavernous walls of the chamber. He stared into one of the pods. It contained a girl, ten or eleven years old, submerged in a yellowish fluid, her black hair floating about her head. She had pointy ears like an elf, which Jack thought was kinda cute until he saw the girls floating inside the next several pods. They were all clones, just like the soldiers.
Jack turned to the soldier who wielded Big Bertha. The soldier, with his boyish good looks, bore a striking resemblance to the clone girls floating inside the tanks. “The hell are you freaks?”
The soldier flared his nostrils. “We are perfection.”
Jack scoffed. “I dunno about that. Little tween girls might rate you a ten out of ten. But for a real woman, unless she's got a weird fetish for anime boys, you're barely a seven.”
“And how do you rate among human women?” Asked Anime Boy.
Jack was surprised Anime Boy was willing to go along with this conversation. “Naturally, I'm a nine out of ten, and I'm being humble.”
“It is naturally that hairy apes find other hairy apes attractive.”
“You're just jealous of my manly stubble.”
They passed through the golden arch at the end of the aisle and entered a smaller chamber guarded by a terracotta army of seven foot tall humanoid robots. Bronze plate armour covered the robots from head to toe. Their eyes were crimson; their masks silver. Some had bushy metallic beards. Others had goatees. Some had prominent cheek bones. Others had muscular jaws. Many bore menacing expressions. A few maintained a stoic gaze. All of them carried a heavy machine gun.
A stunningly beautiful woman sat at the far end of the chamber upon a silver throne raised on a golden dais shaped like a lotus flower. She had jet-black hair which she wore in an intricate knot that resembled a blossoming flower. She had silky-white skin, which she left exposed from the V of her neck to the cleavage of her bosom. She wore silver and white regalia that glowed under the radiant light beaming down on her from above. A silver orb, suspended by golden tendrils, hung above her throne. The orb contained a glowing blue iris within it, which shifted towards Jack as he approached the throne.
He had only ever seen Gabriella in old photographs and video recordings. The woman who now sat before him looked a good thirty years younger than the woman he had read about in the history books, but there was no mistaking the Mother of Lies. Whoever did her face lift deserved a medal.
Anime Boy struck the back of Jack's left knee. “Kneel before the Mother.”
Down on one knee, Jack winked at Gabriella. “Howdy?” It was hardly an appropriate greeting given the gravity of the situation, but Jack's foolhardy bravado wasn't without purpose. He needed to exude confidence. Gabriella had him brought here for a reason. That reason was to negotiate otherwise he and his friends would be dead already, and every negotiator worth his salt understood that confidence conveyed strength and strength equalled leverage.
“What is your name?” She asked.
“Lieutenant Jack Jeremiah Hanlon, CEO and CFO of Mars Adventure Studio LLC, leader of this here fire team of the 13th Mars Boys Forward Battalion, at your service. But Jack'll do just fine.” He gave her a flippant grin to convey an air of arrogant self-assuredness.
Gabriella flared her nostrils. “I should have your throat slit. For the sake diplomacy, I shall refrain from doing so.”
Boy, this woman wasn't amused at all. Jack drew a cut across his neck. “Got a blade sharp enough to cut through carbon C9-T85 super-weave? This here suit's a Zero-point R980, top-of-the-line, manufactured by Zero-point sporting goods company. Upgraded with a carbon-nanoweave, it's capable of resisting thermal burns of up to ten thousand degrees, and vacuum pressures as low as point-oh-oh-five kilopascals. Available for purchase at your local S-Mart for the low price of 49-9-99. Shop smart. Shop S-Mart. You got that?”
Gabriella shifted her butt on her throne. “No doubt your armour is strong. That only means your death will be slow and painful.”
“Well, Ma'am, we Martians live by a sacred code. What goes around comes around.”
She scoffed.
Jack leaned forward and whispered, “Men have been raped up the ass – by a robot – for the crime of raping. We take our code very seriously.”
She glowered. “You dare threaten me?”
“I dare? It's my duty as a Martain to tell you that you got a big fat chicken coming to you.”
Erwin and Derek burst out chuckling.
Gabriella rose from her throne, fists clenched by her sides. “You must not value your life or lives of your companions.”
Jack snorted. “You think you can intimidate us? We're space aliens from Mars, Baby. Haven't ya seen the old classics? Independence Day? War of the Worlds? They blew up the White House. They plucked you puny Earthlings out of the mud and processed y'all into fertilizer. You, you, and you,” he said, pointing. “Fertilizer. You got that?”
At this point, Jack was certain he'd pushed his act too far and it was going to backfire spectacularly. To his surprise, Gabriella sat back down on her throne and quietly stewed. What she was thinking, he couldn't tell, but her silence was a sign that his bravado had worked. She was afraid of the Martians.
After a long silence, she spoke, “I warned Ellen that if she landed any more troops on this world, I would execute my hostages.”
Jack's arrogant facade nearly slipped from his face. The last thing he wanted to do was endanger his father. He willed himself to shrug indifferently. “You kept them as hostages for a reason. If you kill them, or us, you got nothin' to bargain with.” Logically, why else would she need hostages if she felt confident she could do without them?
“The truth is, Jack, I don't have them.”
Taken aback by this revelation, Jack wondered if his father might already be dead. He glared at the Mother of Lies. Could she be lying? “Then where is my father?”
“Ah, so you're the son of John Hanlon? The stubborn man refuses to surrender. He's inside this facility, holed up in the living quarters with his men.”
Holy hell. Jack's old man was still kicking, true to his stubborn nature. But that meant that Jack and his friends had risked themselves for nothing. They could have taken their sweet time getting here with an army with no regard as to whether not Gabriella knew they were coming.
“What about Phil?” Derek asked. “Where's he?”
Good question, Jack thought. Maybe it was only Phil who got caught, and she used him to lure Jack and his companions.
“Phil was just a ruse,” Gabriella answered, grinning smugly. “It is fortunate that you three have dropped by. You will help me convince the others to surrender.”
“They don't call you the Mother of Lies for nothing,” Derek muttered.
She licked her lips like a hungry wolf.
Jack suppressed a shudder. Was she going to torture them? Now more than ever, he had to keep up the bravado. “I'll tell you what. You are going to take us to my father. I will speak to him and see if we can come to an agreement.”
“I will flay you alive as he watches helplessly from behind his walls.”
“Please, you won't even be able to scratch my itchy balls while I'm wearing this suit.” In truth, he did have itchy balls, which were utterly impossible to scratch.
“As much as you would like to think you are invincible wearing that suit, you are not.”
“And as much as you'd like to think you're in charge here, you've been hiding in a hole, probably for centuries. We are light-years ahead of you in technology, we have total command over space and Earth, and you have zero situational awareness. If you aim to survive this war, I suggest that you give us a reason to let you live. As I've said, what goes around comes around.”
She leaned back in her throne and crossed her legs underneath her dress. After a minute of silence, she turned to Anime Boy. “Take them to the living quarters. Hand them over to Hanlon Senior as a token of my goodwill. Hanlon Junior,” she fixed her steely gaze upon Jack, “will convince his father to surrender. In return, I will allow them to leave this facility unharmed.”
Jack amazed himself this day. He had never sat across the negotiating table with a cut-throat businessman before, and yet he was able to talk down the Mother of Lies herself, the tyrant who once ruled the entire Earth. He would make a kick ass CEO of a big company. Even better, he noticed the little camera-icon still flashing on the top left corner of his virtual interface. This little exchange with Gabriella was going to make him a rock star back on Mars, not that he wasn't already famous.
Anime Boy growled at the Martians. “Up. Move it.”
Jack smiled smugly as he and his companions followed the soldiers out of Gabriella's throne room. They took the lift down another level and exited into a big hall. They followed a corridor to a blast door marred with bullet holes and scorch marks.
Anima Boy waved at the camera over the blast door. He pressed a button next to the intercom. “Hanlon, we've got your son.”
After several seconds of silence, a reply came. “And...?”
Jack immediately recognized his father's voice. Smiling, Jack leaned towards the intercom. “S'up, Dad? Surprised to see me?”
“I knew you would come.”
Jack flashed a cheeky grin at Anime Boy. “Tell him why we're here.”
Anime Boy glowered, clearly displeased at the situation. “Open up, Hanlon. The Mother wishes for your son to talk some sense into you.”
“Usually it's the other way around,” Dad said. “Alright. I'll open the blast door. You clones better scurry on out of there before my men repaint the hall with your blood.”
“You heard my old man,” Jack said. “Take a hike.”
Anime Boy huffed. He turned to his men and ordered them away with a wave of his hand.
The blast door rolled into the wall, revealing another corridor with a blast door at the end. Jack and his companions walked inside. The door shut behind them. When they reached the end, the other door opened, revealing a line of armed men wearing white Solar Express space suits. They parted to make way for a tall man who had his helmet off. He had white hair and a white goatee to match.
Jack threw open his arms. “Dad!”
Jack's father strode forward, and the two men embraced.
“How is your mother?” Father asked.
Jack let go. “Still in the freezer along with everyone else who isn't fighting.”
“That's for the best. Gabriella is a dangerous foe even in her current state.” Father walked over to Derek and gave him a hearty hug. “And how's my future son to be?”
“Keeping Jack out of trouble,” Derek said. “Amy would kill me if anything happened to him.”
“More like she'd kill me if anything happened to you,” Jack said.
Derek let go of Jack's father. “You know that beautiful fjord outside? That's the perfect venue to host a wedding.”
Father nodded approvingly. “Amy would love it.”
Erwin snorted. “You gonna crush Gabriella's army with the power of love, Derek?”
“Love is why I fight,” Derek said, fist raised.
Father turned to Erwin. “I know you. You're the Hero of Huoxing.”
“I'm the reason we got as far as we did,” Erwin said. “Ain't that right, Jack?”
Jack bobbed his head. “Him and Big Bertha. The man loves his guns.”
Father clapped Erwin on the shoulder. “You're a useful man to have at a time like this. It'll be good for morale, and God knows we're gonna need it.”
“Have you seen Gabriella's army?” Jack asked.
“I've seen the cryo-chambers packed with thousands of soldiers.”
“How do we win this?”
“We take her out. Without her, her clone soldiers will fall into disarray like the insects they are. And I mean insects. They're not human. They were engineered to operate as a hive mind.”
“I didn't know such a thing was possible.”
“It is possible, Jack. We haven't diverted any resources into this research because it's a crime against God almighty, but that puts them far ahead of us when it comes to genetic engineering and blurring the line between man and machine.”
“So how do we take her out?”
“As long as she's got her army of clones protecting her, we won't even get close. Tell me what the situation is above ground.”
Jack shook his head. “Not good. Ellen's landed two hundred men from the Mars Boys Militia. It won't be enough.”
“She sent you three ahead of the main force?”
“Yeah. We were supposed to get here all covert-ops-like, but we fell for Gabriella's ruse. Do you know a guy named Phil?”
“Yes, he's one of my engineers.”
“He told Ellen there was some kind of backdoor into this facility.”
“There is no backdoor, and it would've been impossible for him to contact Ellen. He's been with us the whole time.”
“Well, Ellen spoke to somebody.”
“Ellen knows Phil. Gabriella must have used the voice and video data she collected from us to generate a digital copy of Phil. She's got cameras and hidden microphones all over this facility. Phil's been sniffing them out and shutting them down.”
“What happened down here, Dad? I heard from a... questionable source that you allowed Gabriella to wake up.”
“And what source is that?”
“Some weirdo claiming to be a doctor. Derek, what was his name again?”
“Doctor Sorenson,” Derek answered.
Jack asked his father, “You ever talk to a Doctor Sorenson?”
Father narrowed his eyes. “Briefly. Not long after my men and I found this facility, he appeared out of nowhere in the dead of night. He warned me about Gabriella. I sent men to find him afterwards, but he disappeared. Then the pilgrims showed up.”
“You mean those viking cosplayers out front?”
“Them. And those clones of Gabriella. The viking warriors worship the clones. Apparently, those women have been around since the Nuclear Cataclysm, biding their time, building a cult around them. They came here for Gabriella.”
“Why'd you let them through?”
“There were hundreds of them. I didn't have enough men to detain them all, and I certainly wasn't going to gun them down in cold blood. The warriors stayed behind with their boats. I allowed the women to pay their Mother a visit. I didn't think they could do much harm, and boy did I underestimate them. They immediately seized control of the facility using their telepathic abilities. They activated the defences. We barely made it into the living quarters. We severed the lines connecting this part of the facility to the control room. That's how we're able to maintain control of this section.”
Jack couldn't say he would have done any differently given the circumstances. “What do they want with Gabriella?”
“To restore Eden, of course, and to exterminate the human species, which they loathe oh so much.”
“Why would those viking guys worship people who hate them?”
“Because they believe Gabriella would reward their loyalty by transforming them into one of her children, thereby granting them eternal life in paradise.”
“Why was Gabriella in deep freeze to begin with?”
“We still don't have the full picture. We didn't get too much time to explore the facility. But Phil's managed to hack some of the computers. Apparently, after the nukes took out Gabriella's satellite constellation, along with Earth's electrical and communications infrastructure, she lost control of her legions of robotic warriors. Those that survived the EMP blast ran amok, killing everyone and everything. She had to dispatch her clone soldiers to deal with the rogue machines.
“Unfortunately for her forces, the rebels who launched the nukes had seized control of the remaining machines and instigated the human populace into an armed uprising. It was a bloody war that ended with Gabriella's narrow victory. By then, the entire human population had more or less turned against her. Everywhere her forces went, they were met with fierce resistance.
“She decided to let the human population burn itself out. She retreated into one of thousands of underground bunkers scattered throughout the world. Meanwhile, the human population struggled to survive in a world without power, fuel and machinery. Generations of living in Eden, never having to work a day in their lives, had turned them soft and stupid. They had forgotten how to do anything for themselves, so they slowly starved to death. Billions died in the ensuing winter. Those who lived in more temperate climates fared better, but not by much.
“As Gabriella waited for the human population to dwindle, she scheduled a lengthy gene therapy session for herself, intending to use her spare time to further enhance her body. Instead, somebody hacked her pod and set her to freeze indefinitely along with her entire army of clone soldiers. Whoever it was, he managed to do this without triggering her robotic warriors. I think it was somebody high up in her hierarchy. Somebody she trusted to watch over her as she slept.”
“Damn,” Jack said. “What a story.”
“Why did Gabriella make clones of herself?” Derek asked.
“They were her immortal children,” Father answered. “The perfect beings meant to inherit the Earth after Man had been wiped off the planet with a virus.”
“Those little clone girls we saw,” Jack said.
Father nodded. “Before Eden fell, there had been tens of millions of these children living in Garden Cities all over the world. Gabriella tried to save as many of them as she could, but millions remained stranded.”
“How did they survive?” Derek asked.
“I didn't ask,” Father replied. “Clearly, they found a way to live among humans. They've brought their offspring here, wretched creatures incapable of speech. They hope their mother can heal these cretins.”
“Something wrong with their genes?” Derek asked.
“According to the archives Phil dug up,” Father said, “Gabriella engineered her daughters to remain in a neotenous state indefinitely until induced to mature by a hormone cocktail. In this way, Gabriella could retain full control over their reproductive cycle as a means of population control. During pregnancy, her clones must be fed a steady diet of a specially prepared cocktail of minerals in order for the foetus to develop properly. Otherwise, the child would be born cretinous.”
“I guess vitamin supplements are hard to come by in the post-apocalyptic world,” Jack said.
“Who cares how these freaks reproduce?” Erwin said. “What's our plan to make them extinct?”
“Well,” Derek said, “the bulk of their army is mobilizing for war, leaving this facility relatively undefended. If we're to strike at the snake's head, now's our chance.”
Father nodded. “You and I are of the same mind. It falls upon us to capture Gabriella.”
Jack was stunned by the boldness of Father's proposal. “Dad, that's suicide.”
“If we sit and do nothing,” Father said, “Gabriella will defeat our main force, and Ellen would have no choice but to retreat, leaving us stranded. But if we manage to capture Gabriella, we can force her army to capitulate. Failing that, merely killing her would cause her army of drones to fall into disarray like ants without a queen.”
“What are our chances of success?” Derek asked.
“Does it matter? It's do or die,” Father gravely answered.
“My kind of odds,” Erwin said as he ground his right fist into the palm of his left hand.
“Let's not forget they have every reason to fear us,” Father said. “Their primitive gunpowder weapons cannot hope to penetrate our armour whereas our electromagnetic weapons can tear through theirs with ease. We were born and raised on a harsh desert planet where the very air could kill you, trained from birth to live as strong and independent men. These precious mama's boys wouldn't last a second out in the cold without their mommy lookin' out for them. And on top of all that, we're smarter than they are. Now you might point out they got VTOLs and APCs. They sure as hell ain't deploying those where we are, and their numbers don't mean squat down here in these tunnels. Here in the belly of the beast, it's man against man, and we are the superior men. We will take their bitch-queen and make her kneel before the Sons of Mars.”
Jack roared like a roided-up gorilla. Derek, Erwin and Father's men broke out chanting, “Sons of Mars! Sons of Mars! Sons of Mars!”
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