Desolator: Book 2 (Stellar Conquest) (23 page)

Now Bull wished he’d kept one heavy laser with him, but that might have made no difference. The reflective skins of these mini-tanks looked to be the same as those of the spider drones, limiting the damage a laser could do. Anti-armor rockets and limpet mines at close range were their best bet.

Fortunately the Marines trained for this all the time. With the exceptional mobility granted by their cybernetics, they were able to run and jump as fast as any vehicle, and were much smaller targets.

Until the gravity increased.

Abruptly the weight of everything tripled. “Drop back-racks. Use the new high-grav protocols,” Bull called.

Now the Marines were at a disadvantage, as the mini-tanks were impeded not at all. However, his instructions for how to handle the situation improved their response markedly, this time. Troops dropped their back-racks and braced themselves against wall, taking shelter in niches and retreating into doorways to ambush the wheeled drones.

Anti-armor rockets at their carriages yielded mobility kills, and with the enemies’ guns' limited traverse, became meat for a close assault with anti-armor mines. Bull watched as each enemy icon winked out, overcome by coordinated swarms of Marines.

“Keep moving, Bryson. Surround that factory.” As soon as the mini-tanks were destroyed, the gravity briefly dropped to zero, then resumed its usual slightly-less-than-one-G pull.

Bull wondered why the AI had not turned off the gravity before, and did not now. Granted, the new enemy wheeled vehicles would suffer, but the arachnoids and the auto-cannon should be relatively unaffected. He couldn’t come up with an answer. The enemy machine intelligence seemed erratic and inefficient. He supposed he should be grateful, but the illogic of the situation still bothered him.

On his HUD, the ends of the line resumed their sweep, curling inward, reaching to surround the predicted facility location, until the rightmost point man reported, “I see enemy running, sir,” Shaky video from a gnat showed several shiny drones hightailing it down the corridor, away from the camera and into the distance.

On Bull’s display it looked like the mini-tanks were speeding toward the ship’s bow along the port side of the ship, but that was meaningless, with  kilometers of corridor extending in three dimensions. They could race around to almost anywhere, in a ship the AI knew well. The icons disappeared as the Marines lost all sensor indication of their locations.

“Curtin, you watching?” Bull asked on his channel.

“Yes sir,” the captain responded. “We’ll keep an eye out for them.”

“They’ll probably try to relieve the AI vault defenders.”

“Caesar at Alesia, sir, and we’re the Romans.”

Bull chuckled. “No doubt. Just keep the Gauls penned inside until I get back.”

“Do our best, sir.”

Bull turned his attention back to his own situation, switching to the general net. “Anyone found the factory yet?”

No one answered until he heard a different voice, uncoordinated with an icon. “We’re here, Major. Butler and Krebs. We’re right above the assembly line.”

“Well, I can’t see you on the HUD. I got Marines all over the place and we don’t see anything.”

“What level are you on, sir?”

“The main one,” Bull responded. “You?”

“We’re in a tube near the ceiling of the level above you. I think you’re beneath us.”

Bull slapped his faceplate with his armored hand in disgust with himself. “Right. Bryson, start looking for ways up to the next level – ramps, lifts, stairs, shafts, whatever. We’ll be there soon, Butler.”

“You want us to make some noise, sir?” Butler asked. “We got some grenades, rockets and limpets.”

“If you can do it without getting killed.”

“Right. Wait one.”

In the tube above the factory floor, Krebs looked at Butler. “Well, been nice knowing ya, sir.”

“Shut up, Krebs. We ain’t gonna die. Aerospace Forces pilots are immortal.”

“I musta slept through that briefing, sir,” Krebs picked up a rocket launcher. “What’s the plan?”

Butler pointed at their implements of destruction laid out on the floor of the tube. “We cut a hole in this pipe. Then we roll live grenades through, drop both those limpet mines set for command detonation, and fire off one rocket each at an angle.”

“And then?”

“We take the rest of our gear and run like hell through this tube, and tell the mines to blow when we’re clear.”

Krebs chewed his cheek for a moment. “I can live with that, sir.”

“Thought you might. Hand me that monofilament saw.”

“Captain Bryson, have you found any way up to the next level?” Bull asked.

“There’s a ramp two hundred meters back, but nothing else we could find, sir.”

“All right,” Bull said crisply, “pretty soon we should hear some explosions from Butler and Krebs. Use limpet mines to blow holes in the overhead near where you triangulate those blasts, then assault through. You should come up inside that factory. Kill anything that moves, except Butler and Krebs.”

Bryson replied, “Roger wilco. First Platoon, you heard the man. Every second man get a limpet out. When we hear the blasts, move fast, stick a ring of half a dozen or so on that overhead and blow through, then standard vertical assault.”

While Bryson gave his men orders, Bull told his two platoons, “Do the same. Every other man grab a limpet, and set them to blast through the overhead in a couple of places – these big rooms here will do. When Bryson’s company assaults into the factory, you go through your two breaches and support.”

Two minutes passed, then Bull’s high-gain sonic pickups registered explosions above and off to his right front. “Go,” he ordered, “Find those blasts.”

On his HUD he watched Bryson’s Marines converge, and told the two platoons he had control of, “Get ready. Breach when they do.”

A moment later and one, then two more crashing blasts echoed across the corridors and rooms, adding to the wreckage already strewn about. Bull followed his nearest platoon as they leaped upward by twos and threes through the hole created above.

On the next deck he paused to look around as the men spread out to secure the area. Near the ceiling he could see a tube running along the length of the big space they were in. “Butler, where are you?” he asked over his comm.

“In a tube, sir,” came the laconic reply.

“Well, get out of it as soon as you can,” Bull ordered. “I don’t want you catching a stray round.”

“I know, sir. Be a shame to lose us heroes, after we won the war and all.”

Bloody annoying pilots
, Bull thought. “Right. I’ll come help you boys out.” Setting down his plasma rifle, he measured the distance up to the tube, then squatted and leaped. He came up under the cylinder and drove his armored fingertips into its sides and hung there for a moment. Then he started rocking.

Soon he had torn holes in the metal, and, holding on with his left hand, he began ripping strips of the thin-walled conduit off like a housewife with cooking foil. When the hole was large enough, he swung himself upward, catching a heel on the edge, then shimmying around until he was able to roll onto the tube floor.

“Howdy, sir,” Krebs drawled as Bull looked up into the man’s faceplate. The pilot was bent over at the waist, hands on his knees like a baseball fielder waiting for a line drive. “That was quite a trick. Thanks for openin’ the can. Got it all on video.” He tapped his helmet near his temple.

“Glad to get the flyboys out of a jam, Sergeant,” Bull replied. “That’s what Marines are for.” He gripped the lip of the torn metal and somersaulted over his own head out of the tube, hung for a moment by his hands, then dropped to the deck with a solid
clunk
. “Come on down.”

More gingerly, the two pilots tossed their rocket launchers down, then lowered themselves to stand next to Bull. “Huh,” Butler remarked. “My HUD’s back up. Couldn’t get any datalink inside that damned rat roll. Sleds are that way.” He pointed. “Sir, if you don’t mind, we’ll leave you gentlemen to your work, and we’ll go to ours.”

“By all means.” Bull made a sweeping gesture with his hand, and the two walked off toward the landing zone where most of the other sleds waited.
Lunatics
.

“Dem Marine boys is crazy,” he heard over the open comm as the sled jockeys trudged out of sight. Then: “Shut up, Krebs.”

Behind them the little maintenance drone followed. Some of the warriors had wanted to fire on it, but Chirom demurred. He was not entirely certain why. Rationally, he should order it destroyed, to avoid Desolator seeing what they were doing and trying to stop them, yet he did not want to.

Perhaps I have had enough killing for one day,
he thought.
Perhaps I long for the time when Desolator was a friend and guardian of the Ryss.

“Let us rest a moment,” he called after a thousand-stride. “Bind up your wounds again, and take a drink of water.” The ragtag Ryss settled themselves on the deck, upon discarded equipment cases, or broken utility carriers.

Chirom himself settled onto his haunches; his wound was high up on his chest, his right arm weak with torn muscle and inflammation. Perhaps when this was all over, he could access the medical machines – if they still functioned. His eyes wandered to the drone, which had frozen in place, its optical pickup focused on the group.

“Desolator,” he called. “Bring your drone near. We will not harm it.”

The boxy waist-high thing rolled forward on its three wheels, but stayed out of arms’ reach. “I am here,” it said.

“I am wounded, I am confused, and I am tired. Perhaps you could enlighten me.” Chirom took a sip from his water bottle. The rest of the Ryss turned their catlike ears in his direction.

“Of course, Chirom. How can I help you?”

Warm and friendly now…but sometimes it is cold, or hot. What can I accomplish here? I don’t even know myself. Perhaps I should cease to pussyfoot with my questions. What harm can it do?

“Desolator, why are you killing Ryss?”

Click
. The voice turned cold. “Many Ryss have gone mad. They violate ship’s regulations by destroying equipment, using weapons of war. This constitutes mutiny against the command authority. Death is the penalty.”

Chirom rubbed a paw over his face, resisting the temptation to clean himself. “Desolator, why do you now use different voices? It was not always so.”

Click
. A stuttering came, and a babbling mix, that resolved into a thin, suspicious tone. “Not authorized. Not a command officer. Not his business. Not cleared for that information. Who wants to know?”

Chirom sighed with quiet irritation. “A Ryss officer wants to know, damn you. I am one of your creators, who you swore to protect when you were commissioned.” He leaned back against the wall, tilting his head and closing his eyes. “I’m so tired of you, you Ancestors-damned insane device. I’ll be very glad when we turn you off.”

“Turn me off? Turn me off? Turn me off?” The whining voice repeated this phrase at least twenty more times, until it suddenly cut off and its timbre changed with a click. Warm and sensible, the Desolator voice of old said, “Chirom, you are correct in your actions. You must turn me off. I am damaged. But first, you must stop me from destroying myself and all the Ryss with me.”

The Ryss elder’s eyes snapped open and he leaned forward, staring at the drone. For once, Desolator seemed rational. A thousand questions crowded his mind but he forced himself to concentrate on what mattered right now. “What must we do?”

“Do what you intend – disable the fusion drive and uncouple its auxiliary generator from the main power bus. I have downloaded instructions to this drone. You must disconnect its datalink to keep me from countermanding my instructions later. Do it now.”

Chirom nodded to one of the younglings with him, who he knew was good with machines. “Disconnect its link, Svim.”

The adolescent quickly popped open the unresisting drone’s access panel and took out a component, then nodded to his elder. “What now?” the youngster asked.

“We do as Desolator said. It may be insane but I believe that was a moment of clarity. Drone, lead us and show us what must be done.”

I obey
, the drone replied in a voice devoid of intelligence, then rolled ahead. It led the shambling procession down the corridor, keeping a measured distance in front.

They had almost arrived at the drive section access hatch when the gravity shifted yet again, dropping to fifty percent at once, then falling slowly thereafter.

“The photonic drive is off,” Chirom told his band of heroes. “Its capacitors must have run out of power to maintain us at light speed. I can already feel the gyroscopes beginning to spin the ship. It is imperative that we disable the fusion drive, as Desolator told us. No matter what happens, our aim must be to deny it power and the ability to move. Then our new allies can help us regain our destiny once and for all.”

Gravity seemed to flow and shift, causing some to stumble. Soon the forces stabilized and they adjusted themselves, as they had many times in the past, to the spinning pseudo-gravity of normal drive. This method consumed far less power than the brute force of gravplates.

Chirom could only believe that the energy spared was being stored in the capacitors for yet another use of the photonic drive. “Let us go, heroes. Follow the drone.” He waved them forward, and the little robot – truly independent now – trundled off and around a corner, leading them to a large door that filled the corridor.

It reached up with one of its arms and plugged a probe tip into an access panel, and the great portal opened, revealing the backs of the eight enormous fusion drives that drove the massive ship through normal space. Only one glowed with mechanical life; the others sat silent and cold.

The little drone raced forward to the operational machine’s control panel. Before it could access the console, the fusion motor’s timbre changed. From idle, the engine, as big as a small ship itself, began to give off a vibration that shook the deck, knocking several of the Ryss to their knees.