Ghost Bomber

In the dark, at 1:00 AM, there was banging on the door of Dan's apartment interrupted by loud unintelligible demands in Planet speech.

Dan woke and opened his eyes. Argos ran towards the noise. Dan was still rubbing his eyes when Argos ran back.

"Dan, the City police are here. Get dressed. We have to follow them."

"Am I in trouble? What's going on?"

"Hurry," said Argos.

Two mechanical soldiers stood in the hall, black-armored, featureless. In the street, a matte-black City military car idled with no headlights.

Dan reran his fraudulent impersonation of a camera operator at the Ravine war through his mind. Police could be bad. Dan dressed in silence, then followed Argos and the City police down the building's stairs in the dark. Nobody talked. Outside, the air was cool.

The self-driving military car's doors opened without command. The car drove without lights through city downtown, onto and off a freeway, then along deserted streets next to the city airport, entering the tarmac through a guarded gate. Dan and Argos were led into an airport hangar.

Inside the hangar, City forces had gathered. It was now 2:00 AM. Three long, sharp-winged triangular-shaped heavy bombers were being loaded by flight crew. Engines on. White and red landing lights cut across their skin.

A tiger-sized AI Siamese cat, acting officer, spoke to Dan in plain English. "You are enlisted as a member of Team Tamara. This is a retaliation mission. Tamara will be your team leader."

Dan blinked. "I'm not a soldier!"

"You are a citizen of the City."

There was no further argument. Dan and Argos were issued light armor, packs, weapons. Dan and Argos suited up.

Tamara, already in the hangar, already suited, wandered over to Dan and Argos. Tamara saluted Dan. Dan saluted back. Tamara spoke with the commanding officer.

Tamara's group boarded their bomber. Inside the bomber, the cockpit pulsed with faint orange light. Tamara sat in the front seat. She communicated with tower in Planet Language as bomber engine noise picked up.

Argos nodded. "Strap in," said Argos. Dan and Argos sat in a row of two separated seats behind Tamara's seat. They had an excellent view.

The three bombers were led out in a line onto the main runway by signal robots. Tamara's bomber was last in line. Go signals were given. One after another, the City bombers took off, joining in formation, in the black of night. Three black wings flying over terrain too dark to distinguish—then over the Crater, the Ravine, the collapsed mountains beyond.

Tamara's heavy bomber edged over the mountain tops. Lights. Fire. The enemy city was already burning from strikes by the first two bombers.

Tamara's bomber angled as it went in over enemy territory and bomber engines continued to hum. Here and there, antiaircraft shells exploded in the night sky. Tamara's bomber seemed to be flying itself, but Tamara was intently monitoring screens while the cabin pulsed with data. Transparent overlays mapped heat and enemy grid density. Tamara touched panels. Dan saw twelve blinking markers on target structures chosen on screen.

One by one, bombs fell. One by one, the enemy city landscape below bloomed with devastating silent explosions.

Suddenly, Dan was no longer sitting in the flying heavy bomber, but standing somewhere else. Disorientation. Dan blinked in the night and adjusted. Dan was in a room. A control room! Alone in a shadowed control room inside an enemy power plant. No! Not the control room, but a side office to the control room. Lights flickered. Alien consoles lined the walls.

"Dan!" hissed a voice. It was Argos. Argos was in an adjacent side office. Argos eyes glimmered as Argos peeked through the connecting door between the two darkened side offices. Dan went over to Argos.

Dan and Argos entered the Power Plant's control room. "Destroy everything!" ordered Argos. Together they sabotaged controls, smashed consoles, ripped out cables, turned off power. Everything that could be lifted and used to smash things were used by Dan and Argos to smash everything that couldn't be lifted.

Outside the Power Plant, Tamara was running about, firing her weapon at vulnerable points on the exterior.

Dan and Argos set booby traps in the destroyed control room. Tamara appeared at a control room exit, motioning Dan and Argos to come with her.

Suddenly, Team Tamara had transitioned again.

Dan, Argos, and Tamara now stood outside a massive enemy arms depot, half-dark, flickering with emergency lights. A distant guard post staffed by Black Spheres seemed on high alert, but hadn't spotted Tamara's team. Dan lied down, watching the guard post through the telescopic night vision sight of his weapon.

Tamara and Argos ran inside the arms depot building. Dan silently counted the seconds. Shortly after, Tamara and Argos ran back out again. Tamara shouted in Planet Language. Explosions echoed. Ammunition began detonating in long-burning chains. Dan watched aimless uncontrolled enemy missiles exit roofs and explode higher in the sky.

Team Tamara transitioned again. Instantly. Inexplicable. Back to the enemy Power Plant. Now fractured, echoing with metal groans.

"Where's our flight home?" Dan asked Argos.

"Ghost bomber," said Argos. "Programmed to carry on without us, ever further into enemy territory, destroying as much as it can, as long as it can. This is a suicide mission."

"What!"

"The exit for home is straight ahead. Look for yourself," said Argos.

Black Spheres. Trapped.

"The exit is blocked. Black Spheres behind us," added Argos. Dan looked behind. Every word Argos had just spoken was true.

Tamara's team shuffled backwards, spread out, and crouched against one of the tunnel's walls. Team Tamara could hear the slithering of the approaching Black Spheres. Tamara dropped her arms helplessly, searching hopelessly. Tamara didn't have a backup plan for what to do next. Panic surged.

"Wait!" Argos barked. "Side tunnel—fifty meters behind us. Follow me!"

They ran. Slithering Black Spheres pursued in the chamber behind them. Dan and Argos entered the side tunnel.

Outside, Tamara, running further behind, screamed. Tamara collapsed, sprawling onto the main tunnel floor.

"Don’t—" Argos started.

Dan ran back out, grabbed Tamara by her arms, and dragged her back to the narrow passage strewn with stalactites and stalagmites. Tamara groaned but didn’t resist.

"In! In! In!" Argos barked.

Dan and Tamara made it inside the narrow passage, and the group retreated more meters backwards into the ancient dripping confines.

The Black Spheres were at the side tunnel entrance, generating their characteristic jet engine noise mixed with gloop gloop gloop sounds.

"They won't come in. They need more width and smooth surfaces," explained Argos.

"Can we make it out?" said Dan, catching his breath.

"Do you think you can carry Tamara by yourself up this tunnel?"

Dan looked at the narrow trail ahead.

"No."

Argos and Tamara exchanged words in Planet Language.

Tamara pulled a bracelet from her right wrist and handed it to Dan.

"Put it on," Argos translated. "Just like on Tamara's left wrist." Tamara's left wrist wore a matching bracelet.

Dan fit the bracelet on.

"We're going now!" said Argos, leaving Tamara behind. Tamara nodded understanding. Dan turned and followed Argos. At a bend, Dan checked back one last time on Tamara's condition.

Dan and Argos climbed uphill through the narrow encrusted winding tunnel more than a kilometer. Knocking out an old metal grate, they emerged into open air. They were on the rim of the Crater, 30 km opposite of the City's radio telescope station and gondola ride terminus.

The radio telescope, dotted with red navigation warning lights, curved like a vast silver bowl in front of a black horizon. The night sky was lit with stars. Dan and Argos were standing on the enemy's side of the Crater. Below, the enemy city still burned.

"Can you make contact?" urged Argos.

Dan raised his left wrist. Tamara's bracelet was glowing. Someone or something was on the other end of the line, trying to connect, alternating between Planet Language and English: "Team Tamara, Check In!"

Dan picked up and spoke into Tamara's bracelet. "This is Dan Holt. Team Tamara is in big trouble!"

A voice interrupted. The hangar military commander.

"Team Tamara! Take cover immediately! A medium range ballistic missile is on its way!"

Too late.

The missile's Dark Energy warhead struck the enemy city, detonating into a gigantic electromagnetic plasma, enveloping the city center and rising into the sky.

Everything turned white. Then gray. Then—nothing.

Dan fell.

Argos convulsed beside him. Dan clutched Tamara's bracelet. The noise was too loud, the static too much.

Finally: "Emergency! I’m blind! Argos is down! Tamara’s gone!" Dan screamed.

"Team Tamara, hold position!" said the voice. "We have your location. We're coming!"

Dan’s vision distorted. Shadows inverted. Black became white. Red became pale green. The world shimmered like film run in reverse. Dan felt sick. Dan instinctively turned his eyes away from the bright white night sky speckled with black stars.

Was this death? Dan couldn’t tell. The world had come unglued—light reversed, color wrong, time uncertain. He blinked, but nothing made sense. His sight was broken.

Crashing, burning sounds, with heat waves drifted up from the enemy city. The mountain sides were lit up with secondary explosions. Explosions in black.

Then rotors.

A rescue team deployed—Siamese cat soldiers—eyes gleaming. The soldiers spoke to Dan in Planet Language. Dan couldn't understand a single syllable. Other soldiers nudged Argos' electrified corpse. No response. The soldiers spotted Tamara's bracelet on Dan's left wrist and tested it.

There was a life sign. Tamara was in pain. Planet Language. The hangar military commander was on the bracelet communication link again.

"Dan, what happened? Where is Tamara?"

Four Siamese cat soldiers descended through the tunnel entrance Dan indicated. Over the bracelet radio, Dan listened to the extraction—static, interrupted by whispers, then continuous gunfire. Tamara's voice. A Siamese cat soldier announcing over radio three words in Planet Language which could only mean one thing: "We've got her!" The gunfire kept going, then quieter.

The extraction team emerged, carrying Tamara between them. She was barely conscious, breathing through a mask, her arm limp over the edge of the stretcher. Behind them came Argos—silent, belly up, his joints locked in death.

The rescue helicopter waited as it was loaded, engines idling. Dan climbed in. He saw Tamara’s face, saw Argos beside her, and tried to sit. A soldier helped him down.

The blades carved the night—whoop whoop whoop—rising into a roar. The helicopter lifted, settling into a smooth, brutal rhythm.

Dan sat upright near the door, strapped in tight, shoulders hunched. Behind him lay Argos—motionless—and Tamara, pale beneath her mask. His vision flickered. Outside the window: a white, depthless sky. The lights on the radio dish blinked green—steady, wrong. The stars, black.

Below, the 30 km crater stretched into darkness, its edges burned and glowing. At its center, the approaching mast lit with green lights. The flight slipped past the telescope's feed cabin and continued on.

At last, the City appeared—towers lit like frost. The helicopter descended toward the hospital helipad. Medics waited beneath floodlights, their faces masked in white.

Dan would need brain surgery to repair his vision. Dan switched into hospital clothing, laid back in a medical rest, breathed anesthesia gas through a mask, and counted backwards.

Epilogue

It was morning and still dim in Dan's apartment. Dan's mind was drifting in a dream. Helen's voice interrupted, "Dan, wake up!" Dan jerked and opened his eyes.

Argos lay nearby, intact, black-furred.

"Where am I?"

"You've been released from hospital," said Argos.

"You have black fur again!"

Argos tilted his head, wagging his tail.

"I've always had black fur."

Dan felt fine again. Dan could see fine again.

"What's been going on?" asked Dan.

"The Black Spheres are weaker and pushed back."

"Tamara’s Day," said Argos. "Lunch in the park! Eating will restore your health."

Echo Park hadn’t changed. Trees swayed. Mist curled from the waterfall. Smart animals gathered in silent circles, eating peacefully. Many ran up to greet Dan personally again in their own special way.

Dan sat at the head table once more. Tamara approached the head table and curtsied to Dan before sitting in her customary seat.

Tamara said little.

Dan spoke to Tamara. "Maybe we can be friends?"

Tamara looked at Argos. Argos translated.

Tamara looked back at Dan. Tamara nodded. "I would like that," in heavily accented English.

"You've learned a few words?"

Tamara didn't answer, but there was a thin smile on her lips, as she looked away again.

A lunch speaker gave a slide presentation in the park, in Planet Language, about Enceladus life research.

The lunch group broke up and Dan and Argos headed home.

"You have a new job," Argos announced, wagging his tail, after reaching the second floor of Dan's building.

Dan was intrigued. Argos led Dan up one more flight of stairs. The third floor door in Dan's building, once dark and sealed, was now open.

Inside: "Mars Lab", a sign read in Planet Language QR code and English.

Tamara stood waiting. She guided Dan through. QR terminals blinked. Planet Language manuals filled shelves. A small number of personnel were already hard at work on their personal tasks in work stations containing huge computer screens and lab equipment.

Dan’s chair. Dan's desk.

Tamara spoke in Planet Language.

"You’re the manager," Argos said. "Written report to Tamara every two weeks. Attend the company's lunch in Echo Park on Tamara's Day."

Tamara saluted Dan and left Argos in charge of helping Dan with any additional details.

Dan was stunned. Dan walked around the Mars Lab, introducing himself personally to each and every employee. Argos spoke in Planet Language for Dan. Dan asked each employee what their job was, what they were doing. Smiling faces.

A scientist analyzed isotope ratios in Martian clays using polarized laser diffraction, isolating oxygen-18 anomalies. Another technician measured noble gases trapped in mineral fractures, their isotope ratios hinting of historic changes in Mars’ atmosphere. Elsewhere, ancient impact zone fragments pulsed faintly under QR-spectrum ultraviolet light and a glove box contained deep vein shavings crumbled into a powdery matrix resembling fossilized biofilm.

Dan would need to understand all the projects, the schedules, the expectations, the goals, the budget, the Mars Lab organization chart. Set aside meeting areas and meeting times. Working hours. Human resources. Recruiting. Inspire.

Argos followed Dan back to his privileged manager's cubicle — better furnished, better view. Dan took a breath and sat down. Dan turned back to Argos and spoke.

"I need English translations of all the manuals on my desk."

Outside the Mars Lab’s windows, the tiny Echo Park swallow which greeted Dan in Echo Park, who loved Dan, fluttered on a window ledge, watching.

Tamara’s world did not always offer clarity. Computer memory failed, the AI machines forgot, the City's edges were broken. But still — meaning arose, not from what was given, but from what was chosen.

Viktor Frankl wrote: “Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms—to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.”

Albert Camus said: “The struggle itself toward the heights is enough to fill a man’s heart.”

There was still work worth doing. There were still companions worth sharing a meal with. There were still stars in the universe worth listening to.