I knew from the moment that I woke up that something was wrong.

I sat up, groaned, and reached up to rub at my eyes.  My alarm was beeping on the nightstand beside me, but I had no idea how long it had been going off.  I reached over and scooped the little clock up, holding it up close to my eyes as I fumbled for my glasses.

“Shit,” I grunted, as I read the time.  I was most definitely late.

I set the clock back down on the nightstand, and watched as it slowly sank into the wood.  “Solids variable,” I diagnosed to myself.  At least it hadn’t yet affected the bed – although it did feel even softer than usual…

I looked down, and realized that I was trapped in the bed up to the wrist.  It took several yanks and some creative cursing before I was finally able to wrench free, sending up a spray of liquid down feathers.  I quickly climbed up and off of the mattress before I was trapped any further-

-and immediately slipped and landed on the floor.

“Ow,” I groaned through an aching jaw.  My teeth had snapped together at the landing, and I’d nearly chopped the tip off of my own tongue.

I put my hands down on the hardwood to lift myself up, and they immediately slid aside.  I tried again, to the same result.  “Friction,” I muttered to myself.  Man, couldn’t I take a single morning off without everything going to hell?

I noticed that my slippers were on the ground a couple feet away, and I managed to snag them with one outstretched toe.  Fortunately, their exclusion programming was still in place, and they provided firm traction against the infinitely slippery floor.  I slipped them over my bare toes and managed to shakily lift myself back up.

After one look at the M.C. Escher-esque nightmare that my stairs had transformed into, I headed for my upstairs office.  There was no way I was getting lost in that fifth-dimensional tangled nightmare.

Halfway along the hallway, a young man suddenly popped into existence, dressed in military fatigues and holding a rather large and foreboding rifle.  “Grandpa?” he called out, lifting up the gun to his shoulder.

I punched him in the face and locked him in my linen closet.

After a few more minutes of walking down the hallway, I realized that even though I kept on halving the distance to my office, I was never reaching it.  “Stupid tortoise and arrow,” I grunted, reaching down to lower myself onto my knees.  On the infinitely slippery floor, I was able to slide that last fraction of an inch to cross the threshold.

I really shouldn’t have even slept in at all!  Given that I was surprised by sleeping in, it shouldn’t have happened at all.  But then I remembered that I’d addressed the Unexpected Hanging last month, and so it could once again occur at random.

In my office, I grabbed for the coffee maker.  I’d built the thing around a Boyle’s flask, so at least it was always full and flowing.  I took a large sip, trying to get my brain in gear as I pulled myself up to my computer.

The machine seemed to be taking forever to boot… “God dammit, Zeno,” I told the air as I realized what was happening.  I hit the key sequence to skip ahead instead of attempting to boot every sector.

I should have expected this struggle.  After all, this wasn’t the first time I’d slept in.  But good ol’ Hegel always seemed to keep on popping up, no matter how many times I squashed it.

Finally, I was able to get to my program, where I quickly began countering the errors that had popped up.  If I just sat here as an Observer, I knew, this wouldn’t happen, but even I needed to sleep every now and then.

Finally, with the errors mostly in control, I sat back, stretching, trying to remember what was in my refrigerator.  Maybe my future self, after I took his rifle away from him, would like a bagel or something.

The scout could already feel despair setting in as he cut along the path through the thick brush of the jungle.  He stepped past the carefully positioned leaves, making sure to set them back into position once he had cleared them, and then hurried through the little concealed clearing.

“Carter!  Carter!”  he called out, as he slipped past the grunts as they sat on the wet ground and rechecked their weapons.  The whole camp had been waiting on his return, hoping for good news.

They would be disappointed…

The captain stepped out from where he had been bent over a particularly recalcitrant piece of mobile armor.  “Henson,” he greeted the scout.  Captain Carter had excellent control over his facial features, but Henson knew the man was anxious for good news, like the rest of his unit.

Henson hated to disappoint.  But even before he spoke, Carter read his lack of a grin and knew what was about to come.

Carter had known from the beginning that the plan was FUBAR, even before that division of Reapers managed to slip through and gut half their artillery support before they were put down.  In fact, it was only through their captain’s quick thinking that the unit managed to stay largely together, cutting their own path out of the push of the main enemy force.  By tacking obliquely, Carter managed to use the minor ridgeline of the jungle as a shielding bank, and they hadn’t lost a single casualty even while they hewed down at least three squads of their opponents.

But even that quick thinking hadn’t been enough to account for what would happen to the rest of the army.

From the reports coming in, the rest of the troops had marched straight into a bloodbath.  The generals hadn’t expected their enemies to also have air support, those yellow drones zinging in on the six vibrating wings to spew wide sprays of stingers down on the men below.  Unable to move quickly in the dense jungle, most of the troop squads had been trapped and easy prey.

And then the orbital lances started falling – on their troops.

Carter didn’t know what had happened up above the clouds, how the enemy had managed to gain superiority.  But he’d been trained in the academy to always consider the worst case scenario.  Right now, that maxim was the main point keeping his team alive.

“Talk to me, Henson,” Carter commanded, sweeping his tools off of the hunched-over armor unit to clear a space.

Henson stretched out a leaf, clicking on his eye scanner to project down at the flat space.  A relief map of the jungle flickered into view, marked here and there with dots to signify enemy encampments.  “It’s not good, sir,” he said, trying and failing to keep the moroseness out of his voice.  “The enemy squads have aggregated back into their platoons, and they’re combing through the jungle in blocks.”

The scout pointed at several squares projected on the leaf.  “They’ve already sterilized these areas, it looks like,” he continued.  “They know that their lance splintered up our forces, and now they’re systematically mopping up all of the surviving groups.”

Staring down at the map, Carter shook his head.  “Damn,” he whispered, more to himself than to the scout.  The squad lieutenants were also listening in, and their frowns showed that they didn’t have any ideas.

Carter’s hand suddenly jerked slightly, tracking over to point at another square, off to the edge of the map.  “Here,” he said.  “This is where our dropship landed.  Any chance-“

“Casualty of the first orbital lance strike,” Henson cut in gloomily.  “They knew enough to cut us off from retreating.  They’re aiming to eliminate us here, not just inflict damage.”

One of the lieutenants sighed at this, but Carter just looked considering.  “Wait a minute,” he interjected.  “So they’re bringing everything to bear?  What about the command ship?”

The scout pointed to large purple triangle, hovering near the most recently sterilized square.  “That’s how they’re finishing off their grid sections,” he said.  “If they find resistance, enough to hold off their platoons, they move that in for the gravity lance.  Cut down our armor, mop up the rest.  It’s their strongest weapon.”

But Carter was already shaking his head.  “No, that’s their weakness!” he insisted, stabbing down at the triangle that represented the enemy’s command ship.  “They’ve brought their head down into play.  We kill that, and we turn their army from a focused force into cut-off little groups, just like ours.  We might have a choice.”

The suggestion was utterly ridiculous, but none of the lieutenants spoke up against it.  Carter’s ridiculous suggestions had paid off before, in huge ways.  That was how they were still drawing breath.  But one of the nearby troopers (Johnze, Henson thought?) coughed loudly.

“Cap, we can’t crack that thing’s armor,” he cut in.  “Not to shit on your petunias, sir, but our pulse guns won’t even scratch that ship.”

“Oh, ours can’t,” Carter countered, a grin dancing around his lips as his plan took shape, “but our artillery ought to rattle it a bit.”

“They lanced our artillery,” Henson pointed out.  “First strikes hit there.”

Carter shook his head.  “Orbital lances would’ve scattered them, but some of the squad commanders would have had the good sense to shut down and go dark,” he insisted.  “Terrance was over there.  He’s got a good head on his shoulders.”

“So… what?” one of the lieutenants asked.  “We’re going to single-handedly charge back in, rescue our own artillery, and then throw ourselves at the most powerful piece in their entire invasion force?  That’s insanity!”

“No!” Carter shot back, turning on the man.  The captain’s eyes were alight with fire.  “Insanity is not adapting, simply rolling over and accepting that we’ve been beaten after the first hit!  We can still win, but not through attrition.  We need a killing blow, before they break us down further!”

The captain raised his voice, pulling in the other troopers in the clearing.  “Come on, men!” he called out, his eyes blazing.  “They got the first hit.  Let’s make sure that our counterstroke doesn’t just knock a few teeth loose.  Let’s give them a broken damn jaw!”

Most of the men were already nodding.  They didn’t like sitting around, and Carter had earned his stripes in their eyes.  He’d kept them alive, and now he seemed to be the only one with a plan, sticking to a strategy.  But Johnze held up his hand.

“What if the artillery’s gone?” he asked.

“Then we patch the dropship weapons to fire!” Carter yelled back, slamming his gauntleted fist down on the armor unit in front of him.  “Dammit, we kill that command ship, and we’ve got a chance.  We don’t, and we’re just waiting for death.  And if I’m up against death, I want to stare it in the eye!  I intend to meet that skeleton only after he can climb the hill of my opponents’ corpses!”

Most of the other men were now on their feet, nodding and picking up their equipment.  They had a leader, a man with a vision in his eyes and a fire burning in his heart.  But next to Henson, that doubting lieutenant still hesitated.

“Sir, it just seems like such a long shot,” he said, clearly wavering on this decision.

Carter turned to stare down at the man.  His voice dropped down, from burning fire to frigid ice.  “These are my men, lieutenant,” he hissed, frost coming off of each word.  “And I intend to save every last one of them.

“Right now, we are fucked.  But there is always a way to seize victory – always.  Either I will find that way, or I will make one.”

There was nothing the lieutenant could do but nod.

Carter reached down and flicked a switch inside the hunched-over armor unit, and the machine slowly rose up from the jungle floor.  He reached down and scooped up his rifle, checking the safety and slinging it into the mount over his shoulder.  “Let’s move,” he commanded, advancing forward.  “Daylight’s burning, and your mothers are waiting for me to get back to base!”

And as the captain marched, the troopers fell in behind him, their faces set in grim determination.

Continued from Part I.

Two hours later, Decker was in the operating room, his hands scrubbed clean with a molecular wash by the nurse-droid, a layer of protective antibacterial rubber sprayed over them as a protective coat.  Mrs. Taggett was on the operating table in front of him, thankfully still and silent.  Her mechodist ranting had been replaced by the steady beep of the monitoring instruments.

Directing the nanowatt laser, Decker began the incision.  The small tumor was towards the back of the woman, by the spine, and he had to be careful not to pierce any organs.

Two inches in, the laser blinked, shuddered – and stopped.  Decker paused.  Did he hit something?  The laser was designed to cut through tissue and bone, just about anything short of metal.  What sort of obstruction could he have encountered?

His gently probing fingers, inside the incision, found something hard. It was unyielding at his touch, sharp-edged.  What could this be?

Slowly, with mounting horror, the doctor explored the object, feeling around.  It wasn’t until his fingers found a series of raised shapes, however, that he knew for certain.

Decker had learned to read by touch, a skill that helped increase his dexterity.  “Artificial bio-replicative digestive unit,” he read off, his words moving as he traced the patterns.  The object filled most of the lower abdominal cavity.

His mind was afire with this new discovery, but like a good surgeon, Decker didn’t forget his original goal.  He worked further, now forced to move around this large artificial organ, and eventually found the tumor at its spot at the back of the spine.  It was the work of a few minutes to remove it.

Outside the waiting room, Decker found Mr. Taggett waiting for him, his hands intertwined and twisting together.  “How was the surgery, doctor?” the man inquired, his eyes big and wide.

Decker narrowed his eyes at the man.  “What aren’t you telling me?” he demanded, not bothering with niceties.  He was in no mood to negotiate the tricky channels of diplomacy.

The man dropped his eyes to the floor.  “She’s always been so against the machine parts,” he said, his voice barely above a whisper.  “Ever since I met her.  But when her stomach was failing, I couldn’t lose her!  So I told her that it was a minor operation, that it would all be fine.”

Mr. Taggett was shaking.  “I told her there might be some digestive troubles, but nothing else,” he breathed out.  “Please, doc, don’t tell her.  I think she’d kill herself.”

For a long minute, Decker just stared down at this little, owlish man, this man who had put inside his wife that which she seemed to hate above all else.   And then, finally, he let out his breath in a slow whoosh.

“We removed the tumor,” he said.  “She came into here to have a tumor removed, and it’s gone.  My work here is done.”

Dr. Alan Decker was already regretting picking up this patient’s file.  “What a disagreeable woman,” he thought to himself, staring down at the middle-aged female lying on the hospital bed in front of him, her hands gesticulating as she rambled on.

“Look, doc, I’m not saying that they’re all bad,” she went on, again waving her hands (and, incidentally, keeping Decker from taking a look at the place where he would be cutting into her in a couple of hours).  “But come on, they’re not human!  They’re basically just collections of gears and cogs, not even alive.  They don’t deserve the same rights as us, people made of real flesh!”

Decker had to struggle to control his eyes, preventing them from rolling.  Of course he’d get the hypocrite, the mechodist, the woman who hated androids even as her own flesh was failing her.  Instead of commenting, he forced himself to keep his neutral expression, gently but firmly leaning in with the power of authority.  When the woman’s hand flailed past him again, he reached out and grabbed her by the wrist.

“Mrs. Taggett, I need to examine you for your surgery this afternoon,” he stated, his ice-cold voice cutting through her diatribe.  “Please, if you can hold still, this will be quick.”

The woman glared at him, angry at being interrupted, but she stopped moving about, and Decker was able to lift up her hospital gown.  The nurse-droid had already been in here, marking the exact spot where Decker would make the incision.  If it was up to the doctor, he would have let the droid do the entire procedure – but this abhorrent woman had insisted on a human touch.

Now he could see why.

Everything looked to be okay, the doctor quickly decided, and he was free to leave.  “Wonderful, Mrs. Taggett,” he told the woman in the bed.  “We will proceed with the surgery this afternoon, and you should be free to go home by tomorrow morning.”

The woman shivered, but her angry eyes never left him.  “The sooner I can get out of this house of clockwork, the better,” she snapped.

Outside the room, Decker saw a small man, slightly huddled with owlish eyes, watching him as he emerged.  “How is she, doc?” he asked, stepping forward.  “I’m, er, Mr. Taggett.”

The husband.  “Everything seems fine,” Decker replied.  “It’s a minor tumor that is being removed, and there don’t appear to be any complications.  I won’t know for certain until I cut her open this afternoon, of course.”  He usually tried to avoid such direct language, but his temper was still running hot.

The diminutive little husband just nodded.  But as Decker turned to walk away, the man’s hand shot out to grab his arm.  The touch was light, almost furtive, but it made the doctor pause.

“Look, sir, just…” Taggett hesitated, and Decker wished he could shake the man and get him to just spit it out.  “Just don’t be too shocked, sir.  Trust me, it’s all for a reason.  Just don’t say too much to her.”

Decker had no idea what this meant.  But before he could ask, the little man turned and scuttled back into his wife’s room, and the doctor put this strange little exchange out of his mind.

To be continued!