A.N.: Hello, everybody!
Just before you start reading, I'd just like to say that this isn't a completely new story of mine; I began it in 2005 when I first found FictionPress. It didn't get much attention, though, and I had to take it off. But then a few months ago I thought to myself: "Hey, I've improved a lot now, so why not re-write it...?"
Well then, I hope that you enjoy it, and don't forget to review!

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"All the great empires of the future will be empires of the mind."
-Winston Churchill, 1953

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The first thing that he was aware of was the heat.

It was burning hot, seeping through his clothes and piercing his skin like a knife. His back felt like it had been sitting in front of a furnace for a year, while his left arm stung as if it had been cut and salt had been pressed into the wound.

The man groaned. His head felt like hell and it was throbbing violently. He was disoriented and couldn’t think straight. There were sounds nearby, like the crackling of fire, but it kept reverberating, getting higher and lower in its intensity, making his head hurt even more.

The man shook his head. Almost immediately, some of the pain subsided, as did the dizziness.

Ouch... head, my arm...

The man lifted his head up to look around. But he couldn’t see. Nothing.

To be more precise, there was something on his face. In front of his eyes was a light grey rectangle. Lifting his hand up, he removed the helmet from his head and opened his eyes, before shutting them quickly.

Bright light assaulted his eyes. He rubbed his eyelids and then opened them a fraction, squinting trying to get his bearings-

He could see where he was quite clearly. There was a brownish-yellow dust all around him, stretching out as far as he could see. Nothing sat on the horizon.

He just stared, confused.

‘What the hell...?’ he mumbled quietly. Slowly, he tried to stand. His legs gave way and he almost crashed back to the ground, but somehow he stayed standing. Once again, he shook his head to try and lose some of the dizziness.

He decided that it was best if he didn’t move around straight away, so he crouched down onto one knee. The man ran his fingers through his hair and as he did so, his thumb brushed against something. He grabbed the thing and took it off, looking at it. It was an earpiece. Cocking his head, the man flicked the earpiece on and heard several noises coming from it. Quickly, he pressed it back into his ear.

Whatever he was hearing, it wasn’t good.

‘-Victor 67, what in the hell just happened!?’

‘I-I don’t know! The B-9 just went crazy! I think that the – Holy SHIT!!’

There was a loud explosion. The man lifted his hand up to the earpiece, listening carefully.

‘Oh, Jesus! Man down! Man down! The B-9 kamikazed! Damnit, it just slammed into – Foster, get DOWN!!’

A loud explosion, followed by shattering and chiming noise.

‘I’m down! We're down! The debris landed a block away, we’re fine!’

‘I’ve got an incoming message! Scorpion transmission, it’s hot.’

‘Sir, this is Captain Jim Treadwell. Hang tight, preparing to engage-’

There were several more explosions, one after the other.

‘Woo-oo-hoo! Oh, yeah, bitch!’

‘Calm down and shut up, Foster, before you get us killed. Victor-67, the landing site is-’

He flicked the earpiece off.

The man’s legs were no longer shaking, so he stood up to get a better look around. Almost immediately, they wobbled, but then they regained strength and he was able to stand up perfectly. He flexed them as he stood, looking out in all directions.

By this point, his eyes had adjusted to the glare of the sunlight from above. About twelve metres away, there was a deep trench. It stretched off into the distance, and littering the sides of the trench were lumps of debris, no bigger-

The man paused.

Wait a minute...

He tried to remember. Anything at all, a coherent thought or memory of how he had ended up out here. Nothing. Blank.

Oh, no...

It hit him faster than a bullet. He had no idea who he was or what he was doing out here.

He didn’t remember anything.

x-x-x

‘Victor-67, the landing site is clear. You have a go to land, but make it fast. We have no idea how many of the soldiers are nearby.’

‘Roger that, Captain. We are pulling in; everybody, get yourselves ready to release your harnesses and move out.’

‘Aye aye, pilot. Men, lock and load and pull your pants up! We’re going live!’

The sounds of Cobra Unit’s communications were booming in over the loudspeakers on the bridge of the SB-15. All of the operators and techs present there had stopped almost everything that they were doing just to listen, and as soon as the sounds of dropships landing came in over the speakers, a huge cheer had risen. The people were relived that their friends and loved ones were going to be okay.

There was only a few voices that hadn’t joined in the chorus, but they were celebrating in their own little way.

Except for Harding.

Lewis J. Harding was in the Captain’s chair, looking out at the vast planet below him through the ship’s main windshield. He did feel relieved, yes, but as the Commander-General of the entire Core fleet, he had an equal amount of angst inside him as well.

He frowned. The area of Mas Sadan below him had a dozen billowing plumes of smoke, almost impossible to see from a fair distance but easy to see in low orbit. The chunks of destroyed satellites and fighter ships were drifting a short distance away, still glowing from explosions that had ripped them to pieces. They were small losses, though; only sixteen fighters had actually been destroyed, and even then that was because of accidents.

Not faulty intelligence, like the kind that had almost killed all the ground troops.

Almost from the start, thought Harding sourly, everything had gone wrong. First there was the landing zone. Viper Unit had been landing too close to an urban centre, and at that it was a capital city. Then the Mas Sadan army had unleashed a surprise assault on the unit, resulting in a fierce battle that had destroyed several small buildings and had left both sides with equal casualties.

The only thing that could be done was to send down a squadron of fighters and bombers and flush out the city, then send the second landing force in. At that point, finally, the Viper unit was rescued and the battle diminished. Of course, there were other things that would be brought up but as far as Harding was concerned, his men were attacked and they fought back.

‘Commander Harding, I would recommend re-routing several of the dropships to the smaller towns around Saint Michael’s City.’

Harding turned to his lieutenant, Michael Ferrier, who was dressed in full battle garb. He had his helmet tucked under his arm and the intercom system over the ship was issuing a warning that the next squadron of drop ships was going to be sent to the surface. Harding stood up.

‘Of course,’ he replied. ‘I’d recommend turning the city into a base and fallback point when you land.’

‘Yes sir,’ Farrier said, and saluted. He headed out of the bridge and Harding looked back down at the dusty brown orb in front of him.

He smiled.

x-x-x

The man felt a wave of panic and fear pass over him. Here he was, in the middle of a desert with no signs of people or rescue in sight. All around him was debris and dust, he didn’t know who he was, what he was doing here or even where he was.

‘Okay then, calm down, ease it up,’ the man said to himself, rubbing his eyelids. He took a few deep breaths and the feeling started to subside... but only just.

The man looked around again to get a better bearing of his surroundings. On the horizon to his left was a blue line of jagged peaks that were heavily distorted by the heat waves coming off the ground. About a hundred metres or so away was a deep incline into the earth which came up again a few metres after. Both of the things were useless and weren’t going to help him, and the man kicked a chunk of twisted metal the size of his fist that was on the ground. He watched it roll around for a second and went back to searching, but then he paused.

He looked back down at his body again. He was wearing a black suit; long pants, boots, a belt with a few pouches, and a gun holster. On his upper body was a long sleeved shirt with a thinly padded vest and-

There was a nametag on the vest.

The man tried to get a good look at it but couldn’t, so he took hold of the tag and tore it off. It was made of grey plastic and the letters on it were raised and coloured black. He peered at it.

M. ASDAEL
CUCAF
CORPORAL

‘M... M. Asdael,’ the man said. ‘That makes me... M. Asdael of CUCAF.’

He laughed for a second. CUCAF.

M. Asdael, CUCAF. Let's see, that's the Core United Countries Armed-

Asdael froze.

He knew what CUCAF was. Quickly, he found the buckles on his vest and took it off, flipping it around. It was surprisingly light but hard, like steel. But he didn’t think about that. Printed on the back in bold, white letters was:

CORE MILITARY
7TH UNIT
VIPER

The letters were large enough to read but not huge. Asdael had an uncomfortable thought that it might have been identification in case of the wearer being blown to pieces. He put the vest back on, noting how flexible and light it was.

‘Okay then,’ Asdael said, ‘I am... Corporal M. Asdael of the Core Military. And, add to the that, I’m in the middle of God-knows-where with a-’

He stopped. Somehow, the situation he was in seemed a little too surreal to actually be happening. Hell, he was a soldier with - what was it? - amnesia, he was in the middle of nowhere and he had almost no hope of ever finding out what was going on. He smirked and scratched his head, but saw something on his arm. A deep cut ran along the top of his arm, surrounded by dried blood. It didn’t actually hurt, though; it was more of a throbbing sting. Asdael lifted up his left hand to wipe of some of the blood when he saw something on the back of it.

His eyes widened.

There, sitting on the back of his hand, was a barcode.

x-x-x

The G-Forces of the Scorpion jet began to let their grip go smoothly but surely. George "Gregor" Simpson let out a deep breath and eased the jet back around, towards the central plaza of St. Michael’s City.

He was in formation with nine other fighters and they had just completed a bomb run of a series of buildings and heavy vehicles. The main street of St. Michael’s City, a massive six-lane expressway, now looked like the surface of a moon, littered with wrecked vehicles and bomb craters. A huge cloud of smoke was pouring out of a four-storey apartment block (thankfully abandoned of civilians) which had absolutely no glass left on its entire structure. A few other buildings had suffered blast damage but they were nowhere near as shelled out as the apartment.

George looked out at the plaza and saw the drop ships on the ground and unloading their troops. Some makeshift buildings and barricades had been erected and equipment was being loaded off of two medium freighters. At least a hundred Mas Sadan soldiers were lined up on the ground, being watched carefully. A few civilians were being put into an APC to be taken away to somewhere safer.

But it wasn’t all pleasant.

Dead bodies lay strewn in groups all over the streets, revealing the grisly side of the successful battle. The Core soldiers were picking up the bodies and transporting them to the hospital, and he could see that a few were still alive.

But that wasn’t his concern. Right now, George just wanted to land his ship and cool his heels for a bit. Have a nice drink, socialise a little and take off his cramped, sweaty and most of all itchy flight suit. He squirmed uncomfortably before moving over to the rooftop of a four-storey building where a group of soldiers was waiting.

He eased the Scorpion over the rooftop and began to set it down, paying close attention to how fast the ship was landing. The roof was big enough to accommodate all of the fighters and they all came down at once, blowing a thick layer of dust off of the rooftop as they settled.

George undid the straps holding him into his seat and opened up the cockpit bubble of his craft, moving down the fold-up steps as they came out. He removed his helmet and took a deep breath of fresh air, and threw the helmet back into his fighter.

‘Captain Simpson, welcome to the Saint Michael’s City Plaza,’ said the head soldier, grinning broadly. George took his hand and shook it.

‘Nice to meet you,’ George replied. He realised just how bright the light was and took out a pair of sunglasses, feeling better as he put them on.

‘I’d just like to say on behalf of myself and my men that we are very, very grateful for your last minute intervention,’ the soldier said. His left cheek was streaked with dust which was slightly muddy because of the sweat on his face, but he didn’t seem to know about it. Or care, for that matter.

‘Hey, don’t thank me, thank General Mossman,’ George said. He looked around over the buildings and the plaza and noticed just how small St. Michael’s was. The tallest building was at least ten stories tall, and the average height for the other buildings was only four. He turned back to the soldier in charge.

‘Hey, I thought that the city was supposed-’

‘Yeah, that’s what we noticed too,’ said the soldier. ‘It’s not as big on the surface because of the sandstorms that kick up, but they have basements that are four floors. And that’s at the very least. It’s incredible, and pretty nice too.’

George nodded. It made sense.

‘Come one, we’ll take you guys downstairs to get the briefing and R&R,’ the soldier said, and he headed towards the stairs of the rooftop.

x-x-x

For a while, all that Asdael could do was stare at the barcode in shock. It was... frightening, to describe it at its simplest. The lines of the barcode were set into a rectangle about a half inch high and an inch wide. A series of numbers – 34697 – were stenciled beneath the barcode, along with the same writing on the back of the vest.

‘Ho-ly Shit,’ breathed Asdael. He just stared at it, trying to make sense of what it was and what it meant. The left side sat lower than the right, but when Asdael closed his fist it became a perfect rectangle. He had an absent feeling that the barcode wasn’t a sign of something dark but was instead a necessity, a useful tool.

The initial shock faded and Asdael lowered his hand, surveying the surroundings. The trench that had been carved into the ground only went for a few metres, perhaps twenty, and so Asdael surmised that he must have been thrown off of something that dipped into the ground. But he couldn’t figure out how it could have happened and let out a frustrated sigh. He turned around and raised a hand over his eyes to see, checking for any other debris.

He was so focused at looking at the ground that he didn’t notice what was up ahead. As a matter of fact, it was only at the point that he was turning around and looking for a pair of sunglasses in his vest’s pocket pouch that he caught it out of the corner of his eye.

Slowly, Asdael turned back around to where he had been before. He squinted, trying to get a better look at whatever the thing was, but the sun was in his eyes. Finally, he found the sunglasses inside the left pocket pouch and took them out, quickly unfolding them and placing them on his head.

When he finally got a good look at the thing, he had to take a step back.

On the horizon, rising up so high in the air that it wasn’t affected by the heat rays, was a plume of smoke. It was a thick, black cloud that was drifting in the air and stood out in the bright blue sky like a thorn in the tip of a thumb. It was huge, but far away; Asdael took a quick estimate and thought that it might have been at least fifteen miles away and maybe twenty at the most.

‘Wow,’ said Asdael, the word hanging on the wind. He decided in a split second that if there was smoke, there was bound to be someone there. It was entirely possible that the smoke belonged to the thing that he had fallen off, and even if no-one was alive there he could just use any computer files to find out what was going on.

Quickly, Asdael reached for the gun in his holster. It was a small SMG-type weapon, with a grip in front of the trigger that was hollow. Asdael reached for a pocket on his belt and took out a magazine, loaded it into the grip of the SMG and racked it. He took a deep breath and cracked his knuckles before walking towards the plume.

‘Here goes nothing,’ Asdael said to himself as he walked, the sun still hot on his back.

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A.N.: So then, reviews, crits? I'd love to know about what you think of the story. Thanks!