Belle Chance

The green stalk slowly sprang back upright. Although dented somewhat, it had survived the onslaught of the soldier’s boot. The soldier deliberately made slow progress towards the mangled wire fence, so as to not to register as movement from the distant automatic motion detectors sited along the roads. Stopping, she lazily looked behind herself and saw a trail of slowly rising grass behind, leading down to the river now partially hidden by the early morning fog amongst the trees.

She had started her journey before dawn as she had slithered out of the insect infested sluggish waters. The night had been spent at the bottom of the river in a disposable wet suit and oxygen exchanger mask. Previous to that she had spent 4 days stealthily moving through the devastated lost county of Essex. Which now comprised the border between the Ontario Republic and the newly formed Detroit City State. DCS was her current target to infiltrate and complete her mission. The plan was that in the ensuing chaos, Detroit would be unable to hold Essex and the unruly and murderous Michiganders would be put in their place.

By the time the sun had climbed just above the tops of the pine trees, the soldier reached the fence next to the road. The wood also finished at the fence line, a recent occurrence judging by the numerous fragrant stumps on the other side of the road. Fortunately this gave a clear view of the target location, a fortified residence called Belle Chance.

Locating suitable undergroth to camouflage behind, she removed her battery and replaced it was her spare. She set up a solar panel to recharge her depleted battery, whilst she performed a quick reconnaise around the old farm. This included half an hour locating and hacking the feeds for the motion detectors. By the time she returned, the main battery had recharged, so she swapped again. After finishing the last of her nourishment and fluids, she began a more detailed observation of the General's residence on Belle Island. She had planned this thoroughly for the past year, with her superiors in the Toronto bunker, but the sudden rise of 'Blight' Bill had accelerated their plans.

The whole Island had been cleared recently to house the de facto ruler of Detroit. General Bill Jackson was the new head of the ruling Military Council, a survivor of the drone wars that fragmented the old USA during the sixties. He had garnered a reputation for weaponizing viruses against any opposition, whether military or political. His most famous product was named Jackson’s Encephalitis, with which he had annihilated the population of Essex in 2078, most of the survivors fled north to Chatham. Unfortunately his family had also died; his wife and 2 daughters disappearing in the maelstrom. Many hospices throughout Ontario and Detroit now house the brain damaged refugees. His own soldiers were mostly protected by genetic patches, manufactured at Traverse City by the University Militia Research Department, called Xanadu. Hardly a new dawn of utopian ideals.

The soldier spent the rest of the afternoons daylight studying the movements within the residence. The patrols became predictable, and would be easily dodged or dealt with, consisting of only two guards. They were also lazy and complacent, relying on their anti drone defences. Pericularly they studiously avoided the southern field containing a small herd of cows and the old bull. Looming over that field was one of the four electronic hardened towers housing the fearsome point defence cannons, each located 20 meters from the building's corners. The small garrison only numbered a dozen, including the tower operators. No real threat for a Babsooka class soldier.; even one as lightly armed and defective as she was.

Once dusk began to fall, the soldier gathered her equipment, then quietly buried her meagre rubbish. She left a tiny digital radio booster staked to a tree. Waiting for the patrol to pass her location she waited a minute then crept over the fence before quickly covering the ground to the southern field. She approached the herd, who did not react noticeably to her presence, except with the odd welcoming snort. Deftly navigating a route through the herd, she stopped suddenly when she saw the bull at the far end of the field by the tower. The bull was an old critter, with skinny white flanks and twisted horns. Born on a farm, the soldier masterfully encouraged the herd to head towards the bull. Over the space of a few minutes the herd walked and chewed their way across the field. The bull was intrigued by the sweet smelling interloper. However he was pacified when she scratched him on his favourite spot head and nuzzled her.

Enjoying each other's company for a few moments, the soldier reluctantly encouraged him to take the herd to the far fence. With that done she left her friend and began climbing the tower, the only one not electrified.

Within a minute she had disabled the deadly cannon by fusing the power cords for the electric motor. Over the next five minutes she did the same to the other three towers, leaving the each operator in their seat paralysed and slowly suffocating from a military toxin, delivered by micro drone through the air vents. At this point she deviated from the plan agreed with her superior officers. The original plan would be for her to retreat to a safe location and then call in a drone strike, and then return to Toronto. She had no intention of returning, she wanted to die at home. She took out a small radio ear bud and placed it in her right ear. Booting up the device remotely with her visor, she connected with the tight radio beam from the tree outside. Then, she selected her chosen music for the night, ‘Another one bites the Dust’ by Queen.

Abandoning all pretence of stealth, she jumped down from the tower ande marched to the beat straight at the front doors. Shouting “Let’s Go” she kicked in the locked front door. The shout alarmed the cows and they galloped away while the soldier drew both of her toxin pistols. The two guards had barely stood up when each sprouted the green tinted darts to their necks. One managed to draw his machine pistol before collapsing, the other failed to hit the alarm, although her shout had rendered the action unnecessary. Bounding across the hallway to the left hand spiral stairs, the soldier was halfway up the second flight of stairs, when the alarm began blaring throughout the building. Reaching the top of the stairs, she twisted and fired at movement to her right. A third guard died quickly.

She tapped her fingers on the pistol and mouthed in time with the song ‘Another one gone’.

Snatching up his machine pistol, she stalked down the landing. Bursting out of a far door, half dressed and loading an assault rifle, the teenage guard was dispatched brutally by a precise lead spray.

‘Another one bites the dust’.

One stray bullet destroyed the window, sending shards cartwheeling into the night. Methodically opening all the doors, she eliminated two more guards in the western wing. Heading towards the Eastern wing, she ducked and rolled as a stitch of holes waist height. Quickly loosing a staccato of shots at the kneeling figure, his right knee dissolved sending him screaming to the floor. Standing up and walking past him, she silenced him with a single shot through his left pleading eye.

‘And another one gone’. That accounted for all but one of the guards. Turning off the music, she also removed her combat visor, revealing an armoured plastic face with decidedly brown human eyes. Discarding the visor, she activated the radio planted earlier. A signal activated the dozen drones hidden at the bottom of the river by the soldier yesterday.

Looking down at her leg, she noticed a bullet had struck her leg, denting the hardened laminate. Luckily the bullet had not hit anything vital. The cyborg walked to the far door of the eastern wing, dropping the machine pistol onto the luxurious carpet, with a muffled clunk. Grabbing the handle she opened the door, as she had done many times before. Stepping into the room, the digital smell her brain received was as she remembered it from her childhood; the cologne of her father.

She lent sideways as the bullet passed her and she flicked out one of her fingernails into the throat of the last guard, who crumpled in a desperate thrash of limbs.

“Take it” she said, pointing to the figure standing in the shadow by the closed curtains. His fingers twitched over the silver revolver on the nightstand. The robotic voice inspired a shiver from the greying figure. Picking up a military hat instead, he carefully fussed the hat into place and stepped towards the cyborg. “I guess this is the end. Can I ask which government sent you to assassinate me, or is it one of my rivals?”

The cyborg remained silent, gazing intently at the beaten man before her, trying to put his fear away to face his death in the manner he wanted. After a long minute, the cyborg said “Hello father, don’t you recognise your daughter Kate? Or did you give up on your wife and daughter after YOU released THAT plague. We escaped, you know, but mother died in Chatham. My body was so ravaged, my only option was this disgusting metal case. The PAIN is unbearable, and I want it to end. But only with you dada.” The daughter gently embraced her weeping father as the drones' missiles impacted the building.

The bull and his family shied further away from the building as it burst into flames. They broke down the fence and escaped into the fertile woodland beyond, and the water meadows beyond them.