Von Neumann’s War

Private First Class Jason Soldiers had lived with his name his whole life. But despite his name, he had enlisted in the 82nd Airborne at the ripe age of eighteen. One of the few books he had ever read, and enjoyed, was called Starship Troopers. In it he ran across a point that really resonated with him. The main character had just joined the military in that book and, much to his chagrin, had ended up as a simple infantryman. He had told this to the one NCO he had met, the recruiting NCO, and gotten a very odd, to him, reaction. The recruiting NCO, a former infantryman missing a couple of limbs, had told him that “the infantry’s the only really important arm. Everybody else supports us. Because we’re where the rubber meets the road.”

That was what he’d told the recruiter when he signed up. He wanted to be where the rubber meets the road.

At the moment, though, he really wished he’d gone in for radar technician or computer repair. He’d gotten the word that there was a group of bots headed for the lasers. And they had orders to take them out.

The only problem being that it seemed like every single one was headed for his bunker. There seemed to be a million of them and they were coming in very low, very fast, and very very hard.

There seemed to be only one thing to do, so he toggled off the safety on the M-240R, picked a point in space over the bots and pulled the trigger.

* * *

The remaining problem of the M-240R, after it was cooled, was ammunition. The best choice would have been the ramjet rounds demonstrated by Dr. Reynolds and Alan Davis. However, producing enough of them in any reasonable time had proved to be impossible. Instead, a modified sabot round was the best that could be created. Since the probes ate metal as it flew towards them, the new round consisted of a plastic outer “shoe,” or sabot, with an inner ceramic round. As the round left the machine gun, the plastic sabot fell away, leaving the ceramic round to do the damage, however the relatively low-density ceramic round tended to tumble beyond about four hundred yards and lost velocity rapidly.

The probes, on the other hand, had a momentum of their own. And the ceramic rounds, while lightweight, could still shatter the metal facing of the probes in tests.

Against the killer probes, however, things did not go as well as planned. Soldiers watched in disbelief as the rounds sparked and crashed into the probes, but seemed to have little or no effect. A few of the probes lost control and slammed into the mountainside in a shower of sparks. But the majority, even when they were struck by the ceramic rounds, continued on as if nothing had happened.

Soldiers stopped firing and spun around, pressing a button he had been told not to use under any circumstances. It was the button that put him through directly to the brigade commander in the bunker.

“This is Soldiers, Bunker One-Niner-Five. Sir, the killer probes are armored, repeat armored. Ceramic rounds have no effect, repeat no effect.”

* * *

“Move it!” Cady yelled, redeploying the platoon so that most of them were on the northeast side. “Shag ass!”

“Sergeant Major!”

Cady looked up in surprise as the voice of the major boomed out of the sky and then realized there must be a PA system on the laser bunker.

“Platoon! The killer bots are armored, repeat armored. Try to hit them on the underside and see if that works.”

“Oh, this just gets better and better,” Jones said, taking a knee and hefting his rifle. The platoon had been armed with the latest version of the sergeant major’s “super-gun.” Thanks to Alan, Lurch and a local paintball company, the gun was capable of firing more powerful rounds, faster.

“Time to cue the music, sir,” Cady muttered. As he did the speakers began to crackle with the sound of thunder and lightning.

* * *

“What are you doing, Major?” the general asked quietly.

“I hope you don’t mind, sir,” Shane said, gulping. “It’s something we would do in Iraq when we knew we were in the deep. Motivational material, sir. Just a song one of the troops liked and we picked it up as a unit thing.”

“ ‘Citadel’ by Crüxshadows,” the general said, smiling faintly. “You do think we’re in the deep.”

“I see a citadel alone,” Shane replied. “Clinging brave, defying fate. Not sure there’s a better description. Sir, permission to speak to Lasing?”

“Do it. Out here.”

* * *

“Lasing, this is Major Gries,” Shane said. “Can you make a bubble to the northeast of the bunker? We’ve got dead ground under your laser. I need to move my troops to cover it.”

“I can give you a bubble,” the lasing officer replied. “Five meters wide and, say, three and a half high call it? That do?”

“Fine, and I’d suggest tightening your fire into that area.”