Galaxy of Heroes

Craaldan infantry moved in around the ship outside on the atmosphere-less surface. The soldiers were equipped with fully contained mechanized body armor, and armed with the CX-649 weapon system.

Their armor was shiny black, with yellow coloring at the joints. Their CX-649 assault weapons were held in their armored hands or slung around onto their backs.

Tanaka was agitated. “Disregard what I said,” he said. “I was delirious.”

“When you said love, did you mean romantic love, or in a more manly camaraderie-type sense?” Spade asked.

“Dammit, Spade, you idiot,” Tanaka blurted. “I was in a delirium because I thought you had gotten us all killed! I don’t love you as a man or anyway else!”

“Now you’re breaking my heart,” Spade said.

Tanaka climbed out of the cockpit. Spade followed him.

The crew watched through portholes as the Craaldan soldiers loaded gear into the Red Wrath’s decompression chamber. Craaldans were already tall, but inside their mech armor, they stood well over ten feet.

Mingus and Brute opened the air lock and pulled the Craaldan gear into the galley. Professor Mahlis instructed the two Megalans to unload two mech armor suits that were packed into a container.

Spade walked into the galley and lit up a cigar. “What ya got there, professor?”

“This one is yours and this one is mine,” the professor said. “Put it on, Captain. We haven’t much time.”

“I ain’t leaving the ship,” Spade said. “Our agreement was that I drop you off.”

“That was not the agreement,” the professor said. “You are to come with me. I need your knowledge of the terrain in order to complete my mission.”

Spade looked down at the little professor, and for a moment contemplated stomping him under his boot.

“I need your help, Captain Spade,” the professor said. “Please get ready. You willl be safely back aboard your ship in five hours, no more.”

“Five hours is a long time,” Spade said.

“You and your crew will be compensated for your assistance,” the professor said. “I only need you for a moment. Then your crew will be safely speeding back to the Outer Galaxy in no time.”

Spade shook his head and stubbed his cigar on a bulkhead. He slid his arms and legs into the black, metallic armor, which mechanically clasped around his torso with a clang.

Inside the mech armor, he now stood taller than Mingus and Brute, who, along with Tanaka, watched him curiously.

“I don’t know if I like the new look,” Mingus said. “It’s frightening.”

“Brute is in command,” Spade said. “If I’m not back in five hours, scram for Meglos. Copy?”

“Roger that,” Brute said.

“Make sure he waits five hours, Mingus,” Spade said.

Mingus walked up to him and wrapped her beefy arms around his armored torso. Inside the mech armor, this was the first time Spade stood taller than her.

“Be careful out there, OK?” Mingus said. “We’ll be worried sick until you’re back safely on board.”

“We?” Tanaka scoffed.

“Hey, Tanaka.” Spade winked at him. “I love you, too.”

Tanaka stared blankly at him through his green lenses.

Now that they had landed, Tanaka again wore the mechanical prostheses that assisted his movement.

“Your mother is a Vomis nematode,” Tanaka said.

“Hey, what do you know about Vomis nematodes?” Spade asked.

Tanaka let out “Hmmph,” and turned and walked out of the galley.

In the mech armor, Professor Mahlis stood nine feet tall. But without his helmet, he looked like a giant pinhead. He put on the helmet. The yellow faceplate clamped shut.

The little professor, now completely encased in armor, looked as formidable as any Craaldan infantry soldier. He lifted from the container a CX-649 weapon system with an attached grenade launcher. Without the mech armor, the CX-649 was as large as Mahlis, but now inside the armor the little humanoid handled it with skill.

Spade put on his helmet, and the faceplate clamped shut. He felt sharp stings of pain as tubes plunged into his skin and into the back of his skull, burrowing into veins and nerve endings. Suddenly, he was no longer breathing through his nose or mouth. Oxygen was being injected directly into his blood stream, as was a chemical solution that fueled his cells.

Spade was no longer using his eye for vision. Instead, a 360-degree visual representation of the outside environment was being downloaded directly into his cortex. He was receiving several visual feeds, not only from the sensors on his mech armor, but from various points around Naos, which allowed for an expansive situational awareness of the lunar surface.

Information on weapons systems, armored vehicles, and the names, ranks and specialties of infantry troops scrolled across his visual interface. Information from Craaldan databases was seamlessly translated for his brain from the Craaldan base language.

Spade reached down and grabbed the second CX-649 weapons system in the container. He was surprised at his ease of movement while wearing such a massive amount of armor. He felt that his range of motion had increased dramatically. His senses felt sharper and more acute, heightening his sensory awareness. The mech armor made motion on this moon feel as simple as a walk in the park on any Earth-like planet.

“Carry this canister for me, would you?” the professor said. The request was transmitted directly into Spade’s cortex.

The professor handed Spade an oblong chrome-colored canister, which Spade slid into a carrying module on his thigh.

“Let’s move out, shall we?” the professor said.

“Roger,” Spade said. Without air in his lungs and vocal cords, his brain impulses were being directly transmitted as speech.

They stepped into the decompression chamber. Brute sealed the hatch behind them. The outer hatch opened and Spade looked up at the black, starry sky of his childhood.

He stepped out onto his home world. His large boots landed with a crunch on the rock and ice.

A squad of nine Craaldan infantry was waiting for them. Spade and Professor Mahlis fell into their formation and followed as the squad walked across the black surface of Naos through an encampment of monstrous battle tanks.

The swirling colors of Roga were visible between the jagged peaks of the Bleak Range. The giant planet was setting behind the mountains, and for the next few hours would not be visible in the starry sky.

Spade marveled at the Craaldan mech armor. He had walked these mountains many times before, but in a human lunar suit, which now seemed clunky and primitive compared to the mech armor. And the CX-649 was light years ahead of any human weapons systems. The CX-649 could spit out a storm of molten metal that could chew through a mountainside. And the grenade launcher, depending on the setting, could kill one man standing in a crowd from a hundred clicks out. Change the settings and it could take out an entire tank platoon.

Spade wished the Naos Lunar Militia had been equipped with Craaldan mech armor and CX-649s when the Diocons had attacked. Then the militia could have put up a fight.

Brilliant flashes illuminated the stark landscape. Shadows danced in the bright white light from overhead. Two missiles had hit the orbiting Craaldan minefields and the nukes had detonated far above the Naos surface. The electromagnetic pulses from the blasts caused static to flicker across Spade’s visual display.

Spade and Professor Mahlis followed the Craaldan squad along a narrow path cut into a steep mountainside. Spade had walked this path before and knew it led to a ridge that overlooked Zander’s Plain.

Spade pulled up data on the squad leader who was in command of their small formation. What was odd was that the squad was being led by a sergeant major—a rank too high to be leading a mere squad.

When they came around a bend, a Craaldan forward operating base came into view, wedged into a saddle below the ridgeline. Aerial defense missile launchers and laser cannons were emplaced at each of the base’s six corners.

Infantry, artillery and armored vehicles were in motion between hangars dug half into the rock. A constant flow of weaponry and machinery moved in and out of the base’s three gates.

The center of the base was dominated by a large tracked vehicle that bristled with antennae.

“Sergeant Major Rupa,” Professor Mahlis called out.

The soldier in the center of their loose formation raised a fist and the squad halted in unison. The soldiers went down on a knee and pointed their weapons outward.

“Stay here with your squad while Captain Spade and I are in the command post with Commander Cripp,” the professor said. “Follow me, Captain Spade.”