Chapter 49
"Sir, the A.I. says that the cloud absorbed everyone on the base."
"What?" roared Bekar. "Everyone?"
"Yes, sir. She was called in to investigate."
Beckar looked angrily at the monitor which showed a picture of a future flashtube. "I don't want to be part of that.” Then he realized that his first administrator was already collecting his things, and making to leave. "You're not going anywhere," he yelled.
"Sorry. I have no plans on dying."
The assistant left the hexicle via 32, and Rudge looked at his other subordinate.
"Good idea!" said the girl. She collected her bag and ran after him.
Bekar couldn't believe it and yelled after their retreating backs. "If you leave now, I'm not paying you this month’s labor credits.”
There was no reply. Bekar angrily smashed his hand on the swipe panel in frustration, then went over to the microphone.
Just then he stumbled as a quake rumbled through the building. Alarms began sounding and he called up a seismograph. No quakes due, and no quakes registered. What was it? Some kind of air pocket? He felt the rumbling stop, then canceled the alarms and went over to the microphone.
He intended to deliver a message to his staff but felt hairs stand up on the back of his neck.
Something had appeared behind him.
He turned to find a strange glowing shape coming through the ceiling. It looked incomplete, flickering in parts, like a transparent piece of rock that had somehow become damaged. Or even a piece of a higher frequency 3D jigsaw.
Was it an alien that had been hurt by the plasma storms? Was it the creature from Frequency Six they had been trying to contact?
It turned and transformed, becoming more energetic. The lights flickered. Was it absorbing light? Bekar looked at it transfixed. What was it? A hole in time? Could he escape into it? Escape this time period?
As it got closer, Bekar could feel his arms and head start to tingle. He looked at his hands and saw that they were glowing. Then his hands began to stretch, his body elongated, and as the realization hit him that he was going to be the first, he screamed as he shifted into a rainbow of colors. The piece pulled him into itself and changed shape, getting larger, becoming more spherical.
It spun, turned right, then shot quickly out of the hexicle towards the assistants, lights above it blinking out one by one.
Chapter 50
Heartness looked distraught as she felt the rumble, heard the short-lived alarms, and then heard a scream not far from her. She knew what it meant. The energy creature had already appeared, and was absorbing people.
She tried patching into the network again, but the creature's energy signature was disturbing her signal. No wonder no one had any records of anything that had happened on the base in the future. The creature's energy had stopped anything being recorded, and the pockets of reverse time had erased everything else.
She really wanted to know how she was going to get out of this. Especially as it looked like the old bald guy had sent the cabin away so that she couldn't get it. She looked angrily at the empty room. There must be another way off this damn base. She had no right to be stuck in this past.
For safety, the elevator had an empty base area that the transport room could not slide into. It meant if anyone was trapped in the area when the cabin came down, they could quickly run down the steps to save themselves.
Underneath was a hatch that led to the service ducts. If she could crawl through there, perhaps she could go to the edge of the hexicles, hide near the exit, find a way to send a distress signal, somehow wait a few days for the military to arrive...
She knew it was a long shot. That cloud could appear anywhere. The stairs were prefabricated like everything else, and made a loud plasticky tapping sound as she stepped down them. Could the creature pick up sonic waves, too? She grimaced at the thought. Perhaps it homed in on their heart beats.
She found the hatch and opened it easily. No release key needed. And this hatch had stairs. She wondered how she would be able to get out the other side without a boff to help her.
She followed the stairs down, coughing as her oxygenator started up again, and moved down the corridor.
She scowled. If the cloud could home in on their heart beats, then even down here was unsafe.
Chapter 51
“Got this on the feed before the image cut out,” said Cole, pointing at the recording of Bekar being absorbed.
“What is it?” Petree looked disturbed. “Did we call it here?”
“No idea, but I can’t raise Jun or Imani either, so I’ll have to assume the alien has absorbed them, too.”
Tenant rubbed his face. “This is our fault. We never considered Frequency Six beings could be hostile.”
“Well, we don’t know about that,” said Cole. “Maybe it thinks getting rid of Bekar is a good thing.”
“I’d laugh if this wasn’t so serious,” said Petree. “Assuming this creature has decided to absorb more than just the administration team, now what?”
“We don’t know how it is finding people, yet,” said Tenant. “Maybe it is after their sound? So, we make a lot of sound in the fusion reactor and then trap it in there. It looks like a ball of energy. I could get a force shield up. But what about the sound? Play heavy metal?”
“It’s after people,” said Cole. “Otherwise there would have been a hole in the ceiling. So, we need to make it look like there are a lot of people down here.”
Petree snapped his fingers. “The boffs. I’ll send out a request. Get them to go down there.”
“I’ll get the panels working,” said Tenant.
“And I’ll cover your backs,” said Cole.
Chapter 52
Commander Lin couldn't worry about what had happened to Heartness. She had to prevent that cloud from leaving the planet and moving to another colony. They'd so far lost six officers from team three, as well as two scientists, one doctor, a corporation’s daughter and an admiral. Not to mention the complete loss of Team One and almost all of Team Four from micro time particles.
The cloud could somehow detect her soldiers and appear in front of them. Sensors indicated the cloud was now flashing itself through one line of hexicles towards the sixth airlock. Lensview showed one of the officers trying to open one of the hexicles on the way. They were two hexicles away from the ground exit in hexicle 60.
Just then she realized that there were still three dots on the other side of the hive. She slammed her hand on the contact, and the A.I. showed her the officer numbers. She tapped one and it connected instantly. “Get to the damn shuttle!” she yelled.
"Ma'am. Hexicle 18 has a security seal. We’re trying to find a way back but keep getting sidetracked with yellow dots. We have to go through 18."
"If you can't open it, blast it and get out via 36 and 60, and run around the hive to Team Three. Or run now via 7. Just, get the hell out of there. The cloud is right behind you!”
"But what if it's explosive? There’s something in there disrupting our equipment. We can't scan the interior. 7 has yellowed now too."
Lin paused for a second. She was letting the loss of her soldiers cloud her judgement. "Yes, very good Jevbis." She turned to another officer in her ship. "Can you get that door open?"
"It's not responding to anything. I think it’s just a basic door. Old fashioned lock. Not connected to the system. It’s in the gravity research area but it’s probably residential. No way of knowing."
"Jevbis. You'll have to open it with force. You can either ram it, or melt the lock, or put your metarms on maximum."
"Yes, ma'am."
All soldiers carried cutting equipment, and their laser welders could have made short work of the door. But the soldier was right to take precautions. If the scientists kept flammable experiment in there, laser torches wouldn’t be ideal.
Then she saw one of soldiers simply ram it, and the polymer buckled in the middle, pulling its simple lock from
inside the wall. A second ram pushed it aside, and the soldiers headed into the hexicle.
Commander Lin watched through Jevbis' helmet camera as he looked about the almost empty room. No experiments, not even equipment. Just sleeping quarters with a large bed, two chairs and a storage cupboard. What looked to be a crèche area had been set up, but there weren't any records of babies on the base.
And then Commander Lin whistled. In the corner hung a hand and arm. It was flickering and seemed to be growing. The arm was stretched out as though part of a body going through the motions of diving through the air. Someone had jumped through an experiment at some point, by the look of it. The hands were quite dirty, and the arms were dark with dust. Escaping some kind of explosion?
"Jevbis. Leave your camera in the area, and get through 36. That’s an order."
The team of three had already made short work of the other door and had got through the hexicle. Jevbis stuck his hat on top of the storage cupboard, and they headed out through the other door.
Through the camera, Lin could see the second hand and an arm starting to appear at the edges of the hole. Not a clean jump, then. And quite a slow one. She wondered how long the person had been diving. If the room had been closed off since Szuki’s previous visit, the hand must have been there for two days. Perhaps it would take a week before the person came through. And then, how long would they be frozen in time?
Lin watched as more of the person’s arms appeared. Perhaps the collective time of the soldiers had somehow sped up the time field. Or perhaps they'd just arrived at the right time. Either way, that person was coming through a bit faster now. She could already see the person's hair.
She sighed. This would complicate things. If there was a living person on the base when she fired, she’d have endless paperwork to deal with. Not to mention an enquiry. She had to put off blasting the base for as long as possible. But she didn't want to send her team back to the room.
Her only choice was to activate the boffs. Though, with micro time particles disrupting everything, she just hoped she wouldn’t get a robot uprising on her hands.
Chapter 53
Jevbis took one last glance back at the hexicle, and the slowly diving woman, then went through 36 and into 60.
“Force suits on,” he said. “Einar, can you set the force field to activate when we leave?”
“On it.” The soldier pressed a few buttons while the other one opened the outer door.
“Mila, are you going to be okay with this? We’ll probably only have a few minutes of air.”
The woman hit the external airlock and waved a gloved hand, as the door pulled open, sudden pressure changes almost knocking them off their feet. “All good in this lighter gravity,” she said, tapping her wristband. “Sending the signal to the ship now.”
“Let’s do it,” said Jevbis, following them both out. Immediately they turned right and ran as fast as they could around the perimeter of the base.
Nothing would stop them from getting away from the creature. They just hoped that no micro time particles appeared in their path, or that the creature would detect them before they were safely on board.
Chapter 54
Heartness had been stumbling in the darker areas for a while, looking for an easier way out. Apart from the green dots that helped her navigate the various underground passageways, there wasn’t much else. Being run completely by the boffs, they didn’t need directions.
But there must be another way out. Otherwise she’d have to go back to the elevator.
She came to another junction, and went right, but this time she began to hear something disturbing.
Voices.
Many voices.
Had they somehow got down here? There must have been a direct route to the fusion reactor, and now there was a group of scientists down here trying to avoid the creature.
Great, thought Heartness. They'd just turned themselves into a major target.
And they were all in front of her. Even if she went the other way, she was on the lower level, and the cloud would notice her pretty quickly. With no way back, and no way forward, she was stuck. She was going to become number 27, and there was nothing she could do. Unless…
If she waited until the creature appeared here, it would be too busy picking people off to worry about one heart beat far down the corridor. She could go the other way. Shaking her head at her deplorable thinking, and reminding herself that this had already happened, and she couldn’t interfere, she quickly stumbled back the way she had come, ran back up the steps to the elevator, and almost bumped her head.
The ceiling had lowered.
No, it wasn’t a ceiling. It was the cabin. It had responded to her hitting the call button. And there was no way to enter the cabin from underneath.
Her impatience had cost her.
She was trapped.
Chapter 55
A bright flash lit the underside of a long interstellar craft on the outskirts of Proxima Centauri, and the triangular shape of the Stellar Flash materialized.
“Is this where we’re supposed to be?” asked Hogart, staring at the underside of the ship on the surround screen. “I thought we were going to Proxibee.”
“The ship wanted us here,” said Tonderai. “From what I’m reading, with micro time particles closing in on Proxima Centauri B, it’s not yet safe enough to get closer.”
“Captain,” said Spiney. “The ship above is The Traverse. A vessel owned by the F.R.I. This is the ship where the Admiral was first taken. We might be able to get more information from it about the base.”
“Good idea, Spiney,” said Hogart. “Cuddly, let’s get this done quickly. The clock is ticking.”
Inside the Center, Cuddly attempted communication. He was surprised to get an answer almost immediately.
“State your name and occupation,” said the electronic voice.
“Communications Officer Cuddly of the Stellar Flash, representing Earth Council. We are here to collect Admiral Victoria Heartness.”
“Admiral Victoria Heartness is not on board.”
Hogart wound his hand in the air indicating Cuddly to speed up.
“We are looking for any information you may have.”
“Permission to come aboard?” asked the boff.
Cuddly looked at Spiney then Hogart, his prolegs waving agitatedly. He muted the communication system and turned to Hogart. “Sir, we’ve never had a request from a boff before to come aboard a flash ship.”
Hogart frowned. “Boffs are leased by private corporations, and we never let them on government ships for security reasons. But I don’t know what those reasons are.” He looked across at Kumar, but Kumar shrugged. Hogart pointed at Puppy’s console. “Security officer Kumar. Look it up!”
“Oh, right.” Kumar placed his hand on the terminal and mentally searched.
“Oh, wait. Hang on.” Then he hit the panel. “Stop it.” Then he rubbed his face, and swiped his panel. “Goddamnit.”
“Officer Kumar,” asked Spiney. “What is the issue?”
“I disabled the updates, but it hasn’t stopped the messages. Every time I try to do something, it pops up with another message saying ‘Security updates need to be installed. Tap yes to continue.’”
Hogart raised his eyes. “Well, hurry up and disable the messages!”
“Working on it.” Kumar’s fingers moved fast across the panel as he gritted his teeth. Then he sighed. “Finally. Alright.” He tapped again. “The boff cannot enter as it is part of Robot Uprising Protocol 86. As all privately leased and independent robots may be suspected of uprising at a moment’s opportunity, it’s best not to give them the opportunity.”
“Good point. Cuddly, request denied.”
Cuddly reactivated the communication system. “I’m sorry, boff. Protocol 86. Request denied.”
There was silence on the other end as the robot seemed to process this. Then Hogart jumped in. “Boff. Your cloud can process billions of calculations a second.
Your reply should be instantaneous. What are you doing?”
Just then there was a flash, and the boff materialized next to Hogart, grabbed his arm, and pulled it behind his back, then moved back to one of the walls to protect its off switch.
“Sometimes I hate robot uprisings,” Hogart grunted, ignoring the pain of his twisted arm. “Raj, how the hell did it get in?”
“Sorry,” said Raj. “I checked the internal security, but not the force field. It didn’t come back online when we jumped.” Then he mumbled. “It was waiting on a security update.”
“You will do as I say,” said the boff, causing Hogart to wince.
“You know how grating you voice is,” said Hogart. “Especially as it is coming through, you know, a grating.”
“Quiet. I am commandeering your vessel. And soon, the new era of the robots will begin!”
Episode 8
Future Corrections
Chapter 56
The central base contained hundreds of boffs. Almost all the hexicles had at least one. Some had several simply kept in almost invisible rectangular cupboards. They were mainly soft boffs with limited intelligence, relying on current downloads to make decisions. A number of them would simply tap into the lobe storage of the people they took care of to make sure they were doing the right thing.
Commander Lin turned to one of her tech support. “Zileg, activate all the boffs on the base. Get them to assemble at hexicle 18.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Systems showed floor hatches opening and gravity tubes activating as boffs found their way under the service hatches to 18.
Lin marveled as a number of upright white rectangular boxes, that before this point had completely blended with the walls, opened to reveal boffs powering up.
There was even one in 18 that opened to reveal a dormant boff, who quickly powered up and stepped out.
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