“What? They can’t be. That’s impossible.” He looked back at the airlock monitor to see Luca stepping out into the cargo hold. She was coming for him. Of that he was now certain.
24
Suicide Mission
Scott struggled with the ties binding his hands behind his back, trying to get them off. All around him were the motionless bodies of Sebastian VanHeilding’s crew. Yet he wasn’t sure how long he had, since they were just unconscious and could come around at any moment. So he wrestled frantically, trying to break free of the bonds.
He had recognized the drone when it first zoomed in. It was Fly, the one that Athena had given Luca back on Earth for her birthday. She was clearly trying to instigate some sort of a rescue, but how much could one drone do against the full complement of Sebastian’s crew? Sure, there were a good few down here in the cargo hold. But he had more, and they would get that drone sooner or later.
He couldn’t break the bonds, and his wrists were rubbed raw. So he rose to his feet and began to examine one of the unconscious crew, hoping to find a knife he could use. He had moved on to the second body when he heard the airlock operating. He stopped, looked over, and saw Luca stepping out. She flipped her visor up.
“Luca, am I glad to see you. Help me get these off.” He gestured with his bound hands.
Luca fished a knife out of a pocket. “How are the others?” she said, slicing through the bindings.
“Cyrus is okay, Steph’s taken a hit, but…Miranda, she’s hurt bad.” He gave her a concerned look.
“I’ve got a rover parked up around a hundred meters down the valley. You think you can get them out to it? Get to Jezero?”
“Possibly. Yeah, I think so.” He rubbed his wrists to get some feeling back.
“Do that. Do it now. And don’t wait for me.”
“What? Are you crazy? We can’t leave you here.”
Luca placed her hand on her father’s arm in a reassuring gesture. “It was only ever going to end one way,” she said. “We all knew that, even if I had hoped there might be another way. But there isn’t.”
Scott shook his head, and was about to argue when she cut him off with a quick hand gesture.
“They want me because I’m a monster. Someone who can inflict devastation on an adversary with a single thought—given the right tools.” She tapped the base of her skull. “I messed up your mission because I wasn’t being true to who I am—who I really am. But no more, this is the beginning of the end. Either VanHeilding Corporation is destroyed or I am. There is no other way. Now go, get to Jezero, save Miranda.” She embraced him, then broke off and headed for the ship’s interior without looking back. From somewhere up above in the superstructure of the cargo hold, Luca’s drone dropped down and landed on her shoulder.
Scott hesitated for a beat and considered going after her—to persuade her to leave with him and the others and call off this suicide mission. But he knew it would be futile. This was a different Luca, one who had chosen her path, and there would be no stopping her. He was also concerned about Miranda. She had taken quite a hammering, and may not survive unless he got her to a hospital fast. He reached down and relieved two of the fallen crew of their plasma weapons. One gave a groan; he might be coming around. Scott didn’t have much time. He checked the weapon and saw it was dialed all the way up—high power, deadly. Bastards, he thought. They were trying to kill us. It was no wonder Miranda was barely clinging to life. He dialed it down to stun and shot the groaning crew member. That would keep him quiet for a while.
He found his way through the packing crates to the storage room where they were holding the others. After a moment or two, he had the door lock removed and swung it open to find that Steph had regained consciousness. She was sitting up, her back against the wall, and Cyrus sat alongside her. Miranda lay flat on her back on the floor in front of them, her face deathly pale.
“Scott!” Cyrus jumped to his feet. “Jeez, I thought you were dead. What happened?”
“Luca showed up, that’s what happened. She sent in that drone of hers and it took out around a half-dozen of the crew. The rest ran for the bridge.” Scott looked down at Miranda. “How is she?”
“Bad,” said Steph, who had also risen to her feet.
“And you?” said Scott.
“My left arm is completely numb, but I’ll live.”
“Luca has a rover parked close to the ship. She wants us to get out now, get to Jezero, get Miranda to a hospital.”
Fortunately, they were all still encased in their EVA suits, which was probably what had saved Miranda—so far.
“Helmets?” Scott asked. “Anyone know where they stored them?”
“Yeah, over there.” Cyrus gestured at a far corner of the storage room.
Scott threw him a weapon and handed another to Steph. They then gathered up the helmets.
“Where’s Luca now?” Steph asked as Scott helped her with the helmet.
“On a suicide mission.”
“What?”
“I think she’s going for the jugular. Last I saw her she was heading for the bridge with that drone of hers.”
“Goddamnit, we have to help her. She’s no match for those node-runners.” Cyrus checked his weapon.
“There was a time when I would go running after her,” said Scott. “We would all go running after her. But she doesn’t want our help anymore. She wants to end this one way or the other—so we just need to get out of the way. It’s Miranda that needs our help now.”
Scott and Cyrus carried Miranda’s limp body between them while Steph led the way through the airlock and out onto the Martian surface. After a few minutes, they were safely inside the rover. Scott started it up and was soon maneuvering it down the valley toward the main Jezero-to-Syrtis highway. Cyrus radioed ahead, informing the authorities of the situation.
Around fifteen minutes later, an ambulance shuttle landed in front of them, just off the highway, and they all transferred into it. Scott and Cyrus slumped onto a side bench as medics immediately got to work on Miranda and Steph.
Through the side window, Scott could see two military shuttles coming out from Jezero, making a beeline for the valley. He wondered if he would ever see Luca again.
25
A Brave Attempt
Luca made her way to an open metal stairway that brought her up to the mezzanine deck of the cargo hold. She paused for a moment as she interrogated the ship’s systems. Sebastian and the remains of the crew had barricaded themselves into the ship’s bridge. With two of the node-runners now gone, there was little in her way. She had the ship in complete lockdown—there was no way Sebastian was escaping her.
Curiously, Luca could not sense the third node-runner, César, in the data-stream. Perhaps, after seeing that his comrades were now brain dead, he’d decided not to try and take her on. A wise choice, she thought, since the other two had been no match for her. Yet she had felt no remorse in rendering them brain dead. Before today, such actions were the soundtrack of her nightmares, the white noise of dying minds. Now, though, she felt absolutely nothing at their demise.
Is this what I have become? she thought. Is this what I want for my future? Maybe it would be better to end it now. All she had to do was give herself up. As soon as that happened, the QI hive mind would activate their fail-safe protocol. The antimatter within the neural lace would detonate, and everything within a half-kilometer radius would be annihilated. Game over.
But Luca’s thoughts were interrupted when she sensed that the crew were trying to activate the ship’s engines, preparing to take off. She needed to focus and keep that from happening until Scott had a chance to get the others off the ship. Below her in the cargo hold, she could see Steph heading into the airlock, Scott and Cyrus behind, carrying Miranda.
She waited in the shadows, her mind interfaced with the data-stream, countering every effort by Sebastian’s crew to lift off. At the same time, she monitored the progress of the others as they made their way to th
e rover, and then down along the valley to the highway—and to safety.
“It’s time,” she finally said to Fly.
“Very good. Shall we begin?”
“After you.” Luca hit the button to open the entrance to the upper levels.
They made their way through the empty utility deck to an elevator that would bring them up to the bridge level. Luca’s interrogation of the ship’s systems revealed only five people were on this level. Sebastian, along with César, the last remaining node-runner, and two armed crew were locked inside the bridge. Another crew member had been posted outside the entrance door, taking cover behind some hastily arranged barricade, armed with a powerful-looking plasma weapon. For her to approach the bridge, she would have to come along a short corridor directly in the line of fire.
But if she were to go down, she’d rather it was face-to-face with a VanHeilding, not vaporized in a corridor. She had to take this guy out somehow.
She checked her weapon, and set it to max. “I need you to sneak up on that position, Fly.”
“That guard is wearing a full EVA suit, including helmet with the visor down,” said the drone. “There is no way my darts can penetrate it.”
“Then we need to find a way for him to open the visor, even for a brief moment. You could enter the air duct network somewhere on this deck, then make your way to the vent on the wall opposite the bridge entrance door. That should give you a clear shot.”
“I could, but how will you get him to open his visor?”
“Leave that to me. Just let me know when you’re in position.”
Fly took off and scuttled into the miles of ducting that wove their way throughout the ship. Luca continued on foot, reaching the bridge deck just a few moments before Fly signaled that it had reached the air vent.
Luca concentrated for a moment, seeking out the systems that populated the area around the entrance to the bridge. As she did so, she sensed César jacking-in. His wave pattern was erratic, indicative of a node-runner under extreme stress. But she ignored him, focusing all her attention back on the entrance.
Luca stood hidden and protected behind a corner. If she were to step out, she would probably be dead in an instant. She checked her weapon and got herself ready. The guard was in a rugged EVA suit, so even if she did manage to hit the target with the plasma pistol set to max, she would probably only stun him. But that might be enough. She focused her mind, sifting through the myriad of sub-systems.
Somewhere in the undergrowth of the stream, César was trying to disentangle the blocks she had set up to prevent the ship from taking off. But he was keeping well away from a direct confrontation with her. Perhaps the sight of his two colleagues lying brain dead on the bridge made him think twice about taking her on.
Again Luca ignored him. Instead, she tunneled down to the electrical control circuitry for a strip of emergency lighting that ran along the ceiling to the right of the guard. She amped up the current flowing to it, causing the bank of lights to go pop, pop, pop in rapid succession. The guard jerked his head and brought his weapon around, fearing an assault. At the same time Luca stepped out, took careful aim, and fired.
An incandescent blue ball of plasma sailed down the short corridor and slammed into his helmet, enmeshing it in a frenzy of high-energy electrical arcs. He reached up and whipped it off his head as fast as possible.
Phitt, phitt. Two darts slapped into his exposed neck. He yelped, pawing at them to pull them out.
Luca stepped back behind the corner and waited. “Good work, Fly.”
“Thank you. But I need to remind you that I am all out of ammunition now.”
“That’s okay. I think I can manage from here.”
The guard slumped down onto the floor. Luca stepped out and strolled up the corridor to the entrance doors to the bridge. This is it, she thought. Once I open those doors, it’s all over.
But there was a new disturbance in the data-stream, emanating from outside the ship. Two military shuttles were landing the valley with at least fifty troops on board. Damnit, she thought. How could Aria allow them to come so close? If she were to go through with her plan and let the QIs annihilate her, would they just see the troops as collateral damage? They will all die—for nothing. She couldn’t let that happen; it was unthinkable.
She paused for a moment. Maybe there was another way—a way in which she could get out of this with some humanity still intact. She reached down and picked up the fallen guard’s plasma weapon. If she was going to do this, then she needed a more purposeful weapon than her own. Then, in her mind’s eye, she accessed the camera feeds on the bridge.
Sebastian stood behind a central holo-table, two crew on either side, weapons raised and pointed at the door. César was jacked-in at one of the node-runner stations.
Luca opened a comms channel and spoke over the bridge PA. “There’s nowhere to go, Sebastian, no way out. Your ship is dead in the water, your crew are decimated, and two military shuttles have just landed. Soon they’ll be making an assault on your ship. So it’s time to give it up and surrender.”
She could see them looking around, wondering where her disembodied voice was emanating from.
Sebastian’s shoulders seemed to slump, and he raised his hands in an expansive gesture. “Very well, you win. We surrender,” he said, and waited for a response.
Luca was taken aback by this sudden capitulation. She had been prepared to die, and only embarked on this course of action in the hope of saving the team in the two shuttles. This now seemed like an anti-climax. Just like that, it was over.
Nevertheless, she put some steel in her voice and pressed her advantage. “Put all your weapons on the floor, near the entrance door, and move back. Oh, and tell your node-runner to jack-out unless he wants to end up like his friends.”
The crew complied, and she could sense César leaving the data-stream. They all gathered together in a group behind the holo-table.
She hefted her weapon and signaled to Fly to come to her.
The drone took a moment to extract itself from the air vent, then flew over to land on her right shoulder. “It seems we have done it, Luca. They have surrendered,” it said, tucking in it wings.
“Best be on the alert for any trickery, just in case.” Luca overrode the control systems for the bridge entrance doors and they sliced open. She took a cautious step forward.
Sebastian gave her a broad smile and gestured to her with open arms. “Ah…so there you are. Finally, we get to meet face-to-face. What an enigma you have proven to be.”
“So they tell me.” Luca relaxed her stance a bit.
Sebastian began to move out from behind the holo-table.
“Get back to where you were, and don’t move from there.” Luca waved her weapon at him.
He threw his arms up in the air. “Oops, sorry, my apologies.” He moved back. “So, what now? Time for a cozy chat?”
“We wait until the military arrive. They’ll be here shortly.”
Sebastian nodded. “So what do you think of my ship?” He waved an arm around like a storekeeper presenting his wares for inspection. “Did you know,” he continued without waiting for a reply from Luca, “it’s the fastest ship in the entire solar system? Not to mention the most luxurious.”
“It will make a nice addition to the Martian fleet since you won’t be needing it anymore,” said Luca.
Sebastian seemed nonplussed by this remark and continued with his list of the ship’s wonders. “It’s also hardened against an electromagnetic pulse strike, an EMP attack. Nasty business, that.” He shook his head at the thought. “Overloading all the electronic systems with a massive pulse of energy.” He patted the holo-table. “But not this ship. It can simply brush it off with ease.”
Luca wondered how long she would have to listen to this crap.
“They say that an EMP strike is particularly devastating for someone who’s jacked-in to the grid.”
Suddenly, Luca realized what the game was. She reached
up behind her skull to deactivate her neural lace—too late. She screeched with the pain as a searing, high-energy pulse exploded in her brain. Every neuron she possessed seemed to fire all at once with the energy of an exploding star, sending shock waves through every nerve ending in her body. She stumbled, dropped her weapon, and clawed at the neural lace. Luca sensed the white noise of brain death approaching. Her mind was being consumed, her body losing motor function.
Yet somehow her finger managed to find the control pad for the lace, she tapped it, and felt her mind collapse in on itself, like the formation of a black hole.
Luca’s breath came in heavy, labored gasps. She felt herself clawing her way across the floor by some deep-seated evolutionary need to get away. Then a new sensation entered her consciousness—movement, but not hers. It was the ship that was moving. Now that she was no longer connected to the data-stream, they could lift off. She felt the power surge of the engines throbbing through the floor, and she started to slide as the ship lifted off and began to angle its way upward.
Luca’s uncontrolled sliding came to a halt when she hit the corridor wall. She gathered all the reserves of energy she had and sat up, with her back supported by the wall. She found herself just outside the bridge with the entrance door still open. She could see the others inside also struggling to get reoriented after the hasty takeoff.
She had blown it. She was so cocksure of her abilities that she’d never even considered there may be a very large hole in her plan—an EMP detonation. It was simple and effective, and well known to render a neural lace useless—and anyone jacked-in brain dead. It may even have nullified the fail-safe that Athena had built in. That had been her ultimate solution. If all else failed, then she would just accept annihilation and take them all down with her. Now she may not even have that option.
Yet, she wasn’t brain dead. Sure, she hurt like hell but she was still compos mentis, having full control of her mind. Beside her on the floor, Fly twitched and jerked, reactivated itself, and buzzed its wings like it was very, very annoyed. If it was okay, then maybe the neural lace was made of stronger stuff than she realized.
Exodus: Sci-Fi Thriller (The Belt Book 5) Page 14