Corpsman by Jonathan P. Brazee Page B

Sergeant Vinter said, steel in her voice.
    “Sorry.  We have to go,” he said, motioning for the other five cops to follow him.
    “Coyote-Three,” the sergeant passed on one of the circuits, Liege listening from just off her shoulder.  “We have a situation.  The Svealander team has just abandoned their post.  Can you please confirm why?”
    “That’s both teams, Sergeant,” Wheng said.
    Liege looked away from the sergeant.  Sure enough, the Tino cops were quickly leaving as well.  Not just the police.  Several hovers from the rear of the line did three-point turns to get out of the way, and a large two-trailer truck was trying to slowly back up.
    “This isn’t good,” Korf said to no one in particular.
    Liege didn’t need to be an experienced combat vet to know why.  The mice were running away for a reason.
    Corporal Sativaa started motioning for the rest of the hovers and trucks in line to back up.  Liege’s instincts were to find cover, but if something was about to go down, they couldn’t leave the civilians just sitting there.  She stepped up to join Third Fire Team in playing traffic cop.
    One of the waiting trucks was a new Wiedner.  The driver simply raised the hover, and using attitude jets on the front bumpers, spun the big rig around on a pivot as nicely as could be—but was stuck as the two-trailer GE didn’t have the same capabilities.  Liege walked over to the driver of the GE to help ground-guide him around when the shout of “incoming!” came over the squad circuit.
    Liege spun around just in time to see three explosions:  one hitting a PICS Marine, another hitting empty dirt, and one hitting the back of the Wiedner.  Almost immediately, five PICS Marines returned fire, focusing on a point out of Liege’s sight.
    The PICS that was hit didn’t come apart, nor did it even fall.  It simply stood there silently.  Liege rushed forward, only seeing the damage to the upper right thigh of the combat suit, almost at the juncture of the girdle assembly.  It was a mass of molten metal and electronics covering a rough circle 25 centimeters in diameter.
    “Cease fire, cease fire!” came over the net, but Liege was reaching up to touch-connect her PA to the PICS’ transmitter.  Liege might not be able to connect to a PICS’ bioreadouts while on the move, but the universal peer-to-peer connection would let her PA act as a repeater.
    To her relief, Corporal Jones was alive.  She was unconscious, but her vitals were strong.  Her PICS had shut down as it was designed.
    Where is the stupid release? she wondered, scanning the back of the huge combat suit.  There!
    She reached up and hit the emergency molt.  The suit went into the molting process with what looked to be solid pieces of the carapace splitting by layers until Jones’s unconscious body was revealed.  She started pulling Jones back and out to extract her when Korf stepped in to lend a hand.  They pulled the Marine out and laid her on the deck.
    Butterflies emerge from cocoons ready to spread their wings and fly.  With Jones, it was like pulling the caterpillar out instead.  Her slick longjohns made her look even smaller than she actually was. 
    Liege ran her scanner over the corporal, finally able to get a full reading.  To her relief, the corporal was in good shape.  She’d suffered some major bruising to her leg and hip, and she’d had a slight concussion.  The PICS’ AI had induced her state of unconsciousness as it sent anti-inflammatories coursing through her body.  It was a precautionary measure, one that Liege could reverse.  She adjusted her injector and gave Jones the injection.  Ten seconds later, the corporal stirred and opened her eyes. 
    She seemed to have a hard time focusing on Liege’s face, but after a few seconds, everything seemed to dawn on her, and she half-sat, her elbows propping her up. 
    She saw her PICS, then muttered, “Shit, Annabelle!  You’re all fucked up.”
    Liege broke