Heavy Metal Pt 5

Parker was right; the rain was keeping the rats in where it was warm and dry. Usually we'd spot some of the braver locals peering down at us from shattered buildings, but motion- and heat-sensors picked up nothing. We rolled on into the rain and fog, Perry keeping the speed at a leisurely 35 mph.

"Let's do some ComSim work," I told the crew. "Load up 37B."

Dex pulled up the Combat Simulation exe, scrolling down to the scenario that had Shelob in a running gun battle with a similar-sized Armor (not that the Rats had anything like her - still, it was always good to be prepared for any eventuality). The weapons crew switched over from live to sim ammo, and soon all the weapons displays read locked and safe. Of course, since we were still in the field these could be overridden and reactivated with a simple slap of a switch on my console, but for the purposes of the simulation we'd refrain from live fire tonight.

"Sim commences in 30," I announced. Virtual enemies began appearing on my displays, showing on my monitor as red-haloed realtime renderings. The weapons crew would see only what appeared to be real adversaries, armed and threatening. RPG-armed rats in the wreckage, mines on the road...and a big old cobbled-together monster built of old-tech bits and pieces and carrying a big-ass cannon on top that looked like it could tear a serious chunk out of Shelob's shell.

"Three...two...aaaaand...live."

Parker and MacDonald began firing in unison, Parker strafing the buildings to clear the threat from above and MacDonald concentrating the big thirties on the enemy Armor. Dex watched ammo counts fall, initiating reloads when they got dangerously low. Powell slid Shelob around from side to side on the road, keeping her going on wheels for now. I knew she'd move to ambulatory soon - she preferred moving that way, said it felt more natural (she once told me, "If they wanted us to stay on wheels they'd have put us in a car"). For now we slewed back and forth across the increasingly devastated tarmac, now faster, now slower.

"Emplacement, eleven-thirty, low," I murmured to Parker. He switched from the rapid-fire Vulcans to the serious 20mm cannons and concentrated his fire on what appeared to be an artillery piece sheltered under a burned-out building face. The building exploded in a cloud of computer-generated dust and rubble, and the artillery ammo went up in a red and gold shower of flame and sparks.

"I could use a little assistance here," MacDonald muttered between gritted teeth. I checked our status and noted with a little annoyance that we'd sustained considerable hull damage, at least as far as the sim calculated it.

"Parker, thirties," I ordered, as Parker had the better shot on the Armor that had veered across the road in front of us.

"MacDonald, mortar. That building at three o'clock - bring it down."

MacDonald pumped five mortar rounds into the base of a teetering six storey building and the combined force of the explosions brought the wreckage down in a crash of concrete and rebar. The enemy Armor, which had been flying down the road at roughly our speed, suddenly found its path blocked. We felt a lurch as Shelob popped a few inches off the ground, then came down nimbly on her six powerful legs and she skittered up and over the top of the wreckage. The other Armor, unable to follow, stopped and began backtracking to try to follow us around the wreckage. I gave it just enough time to commit to the other direction, then gave the word and Powell crawled us back over the rubble and we had a clear line of fire into the Armor's backside. Parker and MacDonald toggled over to the thirties and opened up on the back of the enemy, and that was pretty much the end of that.

We pulled to a stop and all the simulated wreckage and fire disappeared. Everyone's display began running down their stats and evaluations of their performances.

"Well. That was a clusterfuck," Dex announced.

"Mmm," I agreed. "You know, 37B probably gives us the stupidest opponent we get in all of these ComSim routines, and yet we're at...lemme see...32 percent armor viability. What the hell happened back there?"

MacDonald bristled.

"Hey, I was trading fire with that thing while we're sliding up the middle of the road like we're in a goddam parade, and I'm getting no complementary fire from Mr. Parker over there."

"Parker?" I asked.

"Sorry, Cap, I figured those seven or eight rpg's in the building needed some attention."

"True. Powell?"

"This part of town sucks, Cap. No shelter. I tried to keep us swerving, but - well, you know Shelob doesn't change direction too fast - and she's a pretty easy target to hit."

"Also true. So what do we do about this? Granted, the premise is a bit of a stretch - only kind of Armor the rats have managed to put together routinely explodes when they try to start it up. Still. We need to work this one better."

"We'll work it in the debriefing when we get back to station."

At that point I returned to my monitors to take a look around at where we'd ended up. We'd gotten a fair distance into the Sprawl proper by this point, and all signs of civilization had been left behind; the rain and fog hid the glow of the OutCity that would normally be visible from here, leaving us in the full dark of the Sprawl at night.