Repercussions
Page 41
At that point, the officer winked at Dregs.
Dregs, knowing that that was not how it really happened, opened the Link to begin to object.
Something suddenly clamped down on him, though, and a honey-sweet voice said,
The only Saia that Dregs knew of was the SAI that worked for station security.
Suddenly, the hold on him disappeared.
Unaware of the exchange Dregs was having, Theo finally shook his head. “No, we're not going to press charges. The owner wouldn't like it. But let that man know that he's not welcome here for the rest of the month.”
The lieutenant didn't bother to hide her disappointment. “Well, if you change your mind, please contact me.” She passed her professional token to Theo over the Link. “Enjoy the rest of your night.”
With that, she moved off in the same direction as the medics and the stretcher.
Just as they disappeared into the elevators, the general emergency klaxons went off.
“Alert, pirate incursion in Docking Section 3, bays fifteen through twenty. All civilians, head to emergency shelters. Security personnel, arm up and head to Docking Section 3, bays fifteen through twenty,” an unknown female voice announced.
The alert message continued to repeat.
Theo cursed and ran back to the bar, Dregs right behind him. Theo got to the counter, hit the switch to kill the music, and announced that the emergency shutters would be closing in two minutes and that anybody who wanted to stay could.
With that, most of the ship crews ran out to protect their ships, along with some station maintenance people. The rest stayed put, and Theo hit the switch to close the heavy, airtight, metal shutters that sealed in front of the inn's doors and windows.
Dregs noted the surprising number and variety of guns that had magically appeared next to the mugs and glasses on the tables. Theo himself opened an emergency locker and pulled out a multi-function gun capable of firing in either pulse or ballistic slug modes. The ballistic mode had two types of rounds: heavy slug or flechettes.
Dregs, confused and worried, looked around for some guidance as to what he should do, but nobody was paying him any attention.
CHAPTER TWO
STELLAR DATE: 07.17.8948 (Adjusted Years)
LOCATION: Vulgar Penguin, Spindizzy Station
REGION: Nuevo Santos System, Fringe Trade Alliance
Dregs had moved behind the bar, crouched low waiting for orders when suddenly, he felt the security SAI clamp down on him again.
“This is Saia with station security. I'm commandeering this servitor,” she announced on the overhead speakers.
“What? Why?” sputtered Theo.
“Because half my security people are hiding in the civilian security bunkers, and I need to recruit forces to stop the pirates from taking over the station,” Saia responded evenly.
With that, Dregs felt a compulsion to exit the rear of the inn and venture into the service corridor. His legs moved him up the corridor toward a security locker. He felt an exchange of tokens with the locker pass through his Link, and then the locker popped open.
With that, he could once again move on his own, but he still had the compulsion to follow Saia's orders.
Dregs looked through the contents of the locker. On one shelf were various datumcrystal modules with security protocols printed on them. He grabbed one that fit his particular socket, opened the compartment, and plugged it in. He felt the module performing its hot boot, then a flood of information poured in.
As he received the module’s data, Dregs continued looking through the locker, aware that he’d only met one of Saia’s objectives. With his newly acquired knowledge, he selected a pulse pistol with a belt holster and several battery packs. He started to grab a pulse rifle, but then he saw a Honshu Heavy Industries Daemon Model 4, one of the top-of-the-line multi-function rifles in the FTA, capable of firing concussive pulses, heavy slugs, flechettes, and electron beams. He grabbed it, a spare battery pack, some magazines, and several varieties of grenades.
He hesitated at that point, that compulsion from Saia having run its course.
More servitors began to show up at the locker and grab weapons and security modules. Some were of the Workmate series, although these were the old Model 9s and 10s. A few older Nippon Automation Workmate Model 8s and 9s were in evidence also.
Dregs thought it interesting that none of the servitors were less than twenty years old, and all were on their last legs. He absolutely refused to follow that line of thought to its logical conclusion concerning him.
When all the servitors were programmed and armed, that mental pressure returned, and Dregs and the servitors formed up and began moving down the service corridor toward the docking bay.
As they closed in on the bays, Dregs could hear the distant sound of pulse rifles and heavy slugs slamming into walls, as well as the occasional scream, as a round hit something made of flesh.
When they reached the network of corridors just before the actual bays, Saia split the servitors up into four groups and sent them down four different corridors, with Dregs’ group being the furthest right and spinward. He noticed that she had the six servitors of his group in two lines, with three abreast, which looked like a good way to get them shot to pieces. His love of historic military documentaries let him know this wasn't a good tactic.
At this point, Dregs found that he had gotten some control back, so he got past her on the Link and looked up some military squad tactics—which, for some reason, weren't included on the datumcrystal module. He quickly downloaded some examples and contacted her.
Dregs suddenly understood.
With that, Saia's presence disappeared.
Dregs took stock of the weapons his “squad” had: four pulse rifles and two multi-function rifles. He used the Link and selected several combat formation examples to follow. He had no illusions about how effective he'd be. He had no experience at this, so his best bet was to get to those troops fast and let one of them take over.
He placed the pulse rifle bots in front of the formation, on both sides of the hall, taking cover in the recessed doorways. He had the other servitor and himself set their rifles on heavy slug to act as a heavy weapons section.
Next, he downloaded some general infantryman techniques and tactics that he found on the Link and sent them to his squad. He set the two bots with pulse rifles leapfrogging down the corridor, while he and the other bot followed along behind. They reached the first cross-corridor, and suddenly, the fight was on. Both of the lead bots started firing down the left corridor. Dregs directed the other two to quickly cross the intersection, one providing covering fire, the other watching further down the hallway.
“It's some more of those fucking bots,” Dregs heard someone yell.
He grabbed the feed from one of the firing bots and saw several armored figures. He could see that the pulse rifles weren't having much of an effect on them. He traded places with one of the servitors, sending him to guard the rear. Dregs brought up the other servitor with a slug rifle and had him cross the intersection.
“They're only bots, this should be fairly easy,” someone else called out. “Switch to slugs and beams, t
ake them out like the others.”
Following the words, a hail of bullets and beams slammed down the hallway.
Dregs’ little squad weathered the initial onslaught, taking cover behind corners, then popping out to return fire. Dregs took careful aim and peppered the lead pirate with a burst. The man screamed and went down, a round piercing his helmet's visor. The other heavy weapons bot took out another pirate at the rear.
Remembering something from a show he'd watched, he directed his two bots with pulse rifles to combine their rapid fire on one target. That man screamed and went down as well, as multiple sonic pulses slammed through his armor and shattered his multi-function gun.
At this point, shots began hammering at the pirates from the corridor they had been advancing up.
“Security!” one of them alerted the fighters.
“Fall back to the bays, boys,” the leader yelled. “We'll take them on there.”
The pirates disappeared down the next corridor, headed toward the docking bays.
Several security troops in heavy armor appeared, taking up positions on the cross-corridor. One looked over at Dregs’ servitor squad.
A familiar voice called out, “Sergeant Gavin, continue the sweep to the bays. I'm going to take control over there.” She pointed to Dregs and the rest of the servitors.
“Understood,” a male voice replied.
The sergeant gestured to the rest of the squad, and they began to disappear one by one down the corridor. The lieutenant headed for Dregs’ group.
“Nicely done, Dregs—textbook, even. You're just pulling historic examples and following them, aren't you?” At Dregs’ hesitant nod, she laughed, “Saia told me. Don't worry, you did better than she did; you still have all your bots. Show me what you've been doing.”
Dregs passed the officer a vid of the past few minutes.
“Not bad,” she admitted, “but you need to spread your troops out by staggering them. That way, one beam shot or grenade won't get most of them.”
Dregs nodded again, and she laughed once more.
“You can go ahead and speak openly, Dregs. I'm from Alowan and served in the FTA Joint Defense Force, so I'm not going to be shocked that you can put a sentence together. My name is Sarah, by the way.”
“You're a Model Seven with all the major upgrades—yes, I looked you up,” she said, laughing at Dregs’ shocked look. “Saia and I were curious how you managed to attack a human and then make it look like an accident in that short of an interval. Your core is one of the highest classes that Workmate Industries produced at that time. Also, we noticed that you've been keeping up with the patches and upgrades to all of your matrices, so you actually rate at a higher level than a standard security bot, or even the station's NSAI.” Sarah smiled and motioned down the corridor. “So, super bot, go forth and lead your troops.”
Dregs mentally sighed, but he was still happy to be back under human supervision. He rearranged his bots as Sarah had suggested and started them leapfrogging down the corridor again. As they got close to the docking bays, there was a horrendous explosion. A door popped open, and a heavily drugged dockmaster appeared, roaring and cursing about the noise.
Realizing the man was too far gone to be reasoned with, Dregs flipped his rifle to the lowest pulse setting and fired, hitting his leg cast. The dockmaster howled and ducked back into the room and slammed the door.
Sarah yelled at him, “Watch out for the civilians!” She followed up on the Link,
Dregs wasn't sure, but he got the impression she was quietly laughing.
They reached the end of the corridor and entered Bay twenty.
Sarah took over, directing the servitors to various bits of cover. Dregs noticed several security people on the ground, and began moving from cover to cover to check on them. Three of them were definitely dead, two more were maybes, and the other two were still breathing. He noticed that they had cryostasis switches on their armor and all of them were set to ‘off’. He went through and flipped the switches back on for everyone, including the deceased men.
At Dregs’ nod, she continued.
Dregs shook his head.
They began moving down the docking section, Dregs keeping in cover among the docking bay cradles and the massive door mechanisms. Sarah was kept busy directing the other servitors and moving forward herself. As they passed the next corridor, Sergeant Gavin and his men joined them. Lieutenant Sarah had Gavin and one other man take her side of the dock, and she moved into the middle to better direct the bots. She sent another man to provide backup for Dregs on the bay door side. The rest of the squad were to take cover as a blocking force in case the pirates got past them.
Everything was going to plan till they came even with Bay eighteen’s cradle. Several shots rang out, and two of the servitors went down. Sergeant Gavin returned fire, and Sarah quickly repositioned the servitors into better cover. The man with Dregs motioned for him to move up and seek cover in the docking cradle. He made a firing motion with his hand, pointed at himself then the bay door mechanism.
Dregs nodded and moved forward to get behind one of the cradle's clamp arms. He flipped the selector to rapid-fire pulse blasts and peppered the area around the pirate ship. He was rewarded with a scream of pain and a lot of cursing. As Dregs fired, the security man crouched and ran ahead to the door mechanism. He reached cover and began to fire back with slow, deliberate shots. By now, the rest of the servitors were returning fire. Dregs flipped back to slugs and began to look for targets.
“It's those fucking servitors again,” he heard one of them shout.
“Yeah, well, I've got something for the motherfucker who shot me.”
One of the pirates appeared momentarily and threw a round object at Dregs. Dregs fired a burst at him as soon as he appeared, catching him in the shoulder and upper arm. The object curved away to one side, hit the ground and bounced up in front of him, then went off.
Dregs saw a multispectral flare across the entire EM band and was suddenly cut off from his external sensor net. Recognizing an EMP pulse from the experiments on the mining platform, he waited the couple of seconds it took for his built-in Faraday cage to drain off the overcharge and reset the sensor breakers.
As his sight came back online, Dregs heard that pirate yell, “That mother got me again! But I
finished his ass!”
Dregs wide broadcasted over the Link.
He grabbed a flashbang and threw it, aiming so the coriolis force caused it to curve behind the crates. When it went off, it caused another round of cursing, this time from several voices.
She passed a token to Dregs. He applied it to his Link access, and his vision updated with a heads up display that had a map of the docking section containing the positions of the security people and their names.
Dregs tossed the grenade to him.
Sergeant Gavin laughed.
A second later, the explosion tossed debris and several bodies into the air.
From behind the crates came several EMP grenades, aimed at the other servitors. The grenades went off, causing the servitors to freeze and collapse to the deck, motionless.