Silent Order: Iron Hand

by Jonathan Moeller

  March kept himself from laughing. Whatever else Roanna Vindex was, she was no coward.

  He waved to them, and Bishop and Roanna climbed up to the balcony, the grillwork clanking beneath their boots.

  “Charming place, isn’t it?” said Bishop.

  “If you get bored,” said Heath, “you can try to grow some food down there. Save on costs at your restaurant.”

  Bishop laughed. “Freighter crewers don’t have terribly discriminating palettes.”

  “Captain March,” said Roanna. “Do any of these men have knowledge of the whereabouts of my brother?”

  “Don’t know,” said March, “but we’re going to find out. This way.” He hesitated. “Sure you want to see this? Might get messy.”

  She met his eye. “I’ve come this far.”

  March nodded and led the way into the conference room. Heitz and Karlman sat at the table, facing one of the mirrored windows. Beyond the glass, March saw a room about the size of Bishop’s office. A chair rested in the center of the room, and in the chair sat one of the Graywolf mercenaries. The mercenary had been stripped to his underwear, but he looked uninjured, and he seemed to be talking freely to the three Ronstadt men surrounding him.

  “Ah, good,” said Heitz. “Listen to this.”

  Roanna hesitated a little at the sight of the stripped man, but sat down and folded her hands on the table. Bishop sat next to her, but March and Heath remained standing. Heitz hit a sequence on his keyboard, and voices crackled over the speakers in the ceiling.

  “Tell me more,” said one of the Ronstadt men. “Cooperate and it will…”

  “Yeah, yeah, I know the drill,” said the Graywolf. “I didn’t get paid enough to die. Drop me off on a neutral world, and I’ll tell you whatever you want to know.”

  “Very good,” said the Ronstadt interrogator. He was middle-aged, brusquely efficient, and his nameplate read WILSON. “So what do you think I want to know, Mr. Rockwell?”

  Rockwell, presumably the name of the Graywolf mercenary, smirked. “You want to know about that Calaskaran noble, right?”

  Roanna sat up a little straighter.

  “Why don’t you tell us all about him?” said Wilson.

  “It’s like this,” said Rockwell. “You might have guessed we do a little dirty work for the Machinists on the side from time to time. It’s illegal in the Kingdom of Calaskar and a bunch of other starfaring nations, but we’re operating out of neutral space, so it’s totally legal.” Wilson ignored that hole in Rockwell’s argument but let the Graywolf keep speaking. “Anyway, we got hired by this Machinist agent. Ugly bastard with a scar on his face, but he had money.”

  Wilson touched his tablet and turned it towards Rockwell, and March caught a glimpse of Simon Lorre’s scarred face from the images that he had provided to Heitz and Karlman. “Was this him?”

  “Yep,” said Rockwell. “Like I said, ugly bastard. But his money was good, and he paid well, so the captain said we’d take his job. We flew out to Tamlin’s World and picked up the noble. Arrogant little shit, let me tell you. Kept blathering on about his rank and position and how his daddy would make us regret this.” He let out a nasty laugh. “Lucky for him the Machinists wanted him in once piece. Else we would have beat some respect into him.”

  Roanna looked appalled. Though given some of Thomas Vindex’s poor choices, perhaps a beating would have been good for him.

  “Where is he?” said Wilson.

  “Suppose that’s what you really want to know,” said Rockwell. “All right, I’ll play. The plan was to get a big ransom for him from his sister, right? Well, the Machinist agent figured the sister would show up. Then we’d take her, take the ransom, keep the brother, and then sell them both to the highest bidder.”

  Roanna said nothing, but March saw the knuckles shine white against her folded hands.

  “A little treacherous, isn’t it?” said Wilson.

  Rockwell shrugged. “It’s business. The Machinist bastard paid well enough, so he called the shots. We smuggled ourselves aboard the station, set up a temporary barracks in Ore Complex 5, and waited for the noble bitch to show up with her money.”

  “Once you had her, what were your instructions?” said Wilson.

  “We were to take her to one of the old residence domes, one of the abandoned ones,” said Rockwell.

  “Which one?” said Wilson.

  “Dome 12,” said Rockwell. “The Machinist agent is waiting there.” March felt the fingers of his left hand curl into a metal fist. “He’s got a ship tucked away there, a little gunship that we carried on board our freighter when we sneaked onto this hole of a station. Figure he’ll load up the nobles, pay us, and fly off.” He snorted. “At least that was the plan.”

  “We’ll have to confirm that, you realize,” said Wilson.

  “Yeah, yeah,” said Rockwell. “You can give the others the same treatment, they’ll all tell you the same thing. Maybe with more swearing.”

  “Very well,” said Wilson, and he stepped off to the side with the other Ronstadt men, speaking in low voices.

  “We’ve got him, then,” said Heitz with satisfaction.

  “You know where this Dome 12 is, then?” said Roanna.

  Heitz scowled and started to say something acerbic, then thought better of it and spoke in a calmer voice. “It’s one of the oldest residential domes on the station, left over from the first mines. No one’s been in there for years. At least no one’s supposed to have been in there for years.”

  “We’ll need to confirm this,” said Bishop.

  “No problem,” said Karlman. “We can keep the Graywolves confined for a few days if necessary. If their information turns out to be accurate, we can dump them on the next ship heading for a neutral world. Getting home is their problem after that.”

  “I can confirm it,” said March. “I’ll take a look, and from there we can decide what to do.”

  Bishop grunted and looked at Heitz. “We might need to hire your men again.”

  Heitz smiled. “Of course. It will cost you, though.”

  Bishop sighed. “Of course.”

  They started haggling. March paced around the back wall of the conference room, lost in thought as he considered his next course of action. It was entirely possible that Simon Lorre was holed up in Dome 12 alone, or with only a few guards. Perhaps March could slip in, rescue Thomas Vindex, and then escape with the nobleman.

  Or perhaps he could slip into the dome, shoot Lorre in the head, and then escape with Thomas.

  That seemed like the better course of action, if possible.

  Lorre had caused a great deal of trouble for the Silent Order, and March did not spare Machinist agents if he could help it…

  He frowned.

  There was something wrong with the wall.

  The wall had been carved from the rock of the asteroid, but pipes and ducts ran along its surface. The metal of the pipes and ducts had been…corroded, somehow, with dozens of tiny holes dotting their surface like the holes in expensive cheese. It didn’t look like rust or chemical damage, or any sort of corrosive effect. The edges of the holes were smooth as a river-rounded rock.

  The bits of metal had just disappeared.

  “What is it?” said Heath, watching March.

  “I’ve seen this before,” said March.

  “Ductwork?” said Heath, puzzled.

  “No,” said March, pointing at the pipe.

  “It’s corroded,” said Heath, scowling. “This entire station is a deathtrap.” He tapped the pipe with a finger, expecting it to collapse, and then blinked as nothing happened. “Huh. It’s in better shape than it looked.”

  “I’ve seen that kind of damage before,” said March, a cold fist gripping his chest. Maybe the damage was isolated. Maybe someone else had used this old hydroponics bay as a base before Heitz had taken it over.

  But if not…

  March crossed to the window. Rockwell sat in his chair, looking bored, while Wilson and the
other Ronstadt men continued their discussion. Right away March spotted what he was looking for. The interrogation room had metal paneling – and some of the panels were dotted with more of the small rounded holes.

  “Hell,” muttered March.

  “Something amiss, Captain March?” said Heitz with irritation.

  “Yes,” said March. “Did you record the interrogation?”

  “We did,” said Karlman.

  “Go back to the beginning,” said March. “Now. Right now.”

  Heitz scowled. “You don’t give me…”

  “Do as he says,” said Bishop.

  Heitz looked ready to protest, but Karlman reached over and tapped some keys on Heitz’s laptop. March stooped over and looked at the screen. The timestamp in the lower right-hand corner of the video was from thirty-five minutes ago…and the metal panels in the interrogation room were still intact.

  The small holes had only appeared in the last half hour.

  “We have to go,” said March, straightening up and lifting his rifle from its harness. “Now. Right now. We’re about to come under attack from the Machinists. Karlman, get all your men to the lift, now. We need to get the hell out of here before it’s too late.”

  “Wait, wait, wait,” said Heitz, scrambling to his feet, his eyes on March’s rifle. “Have you lost your mind? We need to finish interrogating the Graywolves.”

  “Leave them,” said March. “They’re already dead.”

  “What are you talking about?” said Karlman. “Speak plainly, man.”

  “Infiltrator nanobots,” said March. “Lorre dosed his men with infiltrator nanobots.”

  Roanna, Heath, Heitz, and Karlman only looked confused. But Bishop surged to his feet, drawing his pistol, his eyes wide with sudden alarm.

  “He’s right,” said Bishop. “We have to go now. Karlman, call…”

  “What the hell?” came Wilson’s voice from the speaker.

  March looked through the window just as Rockwell’s head fell off his shoulders and hit the floor.

  There was no blood. When a man’s head fell off, there ought to have been blood, but no blood came from either Rockwell’s head or from the stump of his neck, only a little bubbling of thick black slime that wasn’t actually slime, but the mineral-based byproduct of certain chemical reactions.

  “What the hell?” said Wilson, taking a step back.

  “Shoot him!” said March. He couldn’t tell if Wilson and the Ronstadt men in the interrogation room could hear him. Both Heitz and Karlman were shouting. Likely they thought that someone had shot Rockwell, but March knew better. “Shoot him in the head and in the spine, and do it now! Now!”

  The Ronstadt men didn’t react. Or, rather, they reacted in exactly the wrong way. They moved to the walls, weapons drawn from the holsters as they scanned the doorway and the ceiling for whatever had just killed Rockwell.

  “Sir!” said Wilson, his voice crackling over the speakers. “Sir, we have a situation! It…”

  “Listen to me!” shouted March. “Shoot him in the head and in the spinal column!”

  Right about then Roanna screamed as the headless corpse of Rockwell stood up.

  As it did, the severed head rocked on the floor and then flipped over, metal legs like those of a spider sprouting from the neck. The head skittered back and forth on its metal legs, while the headless corpse ripped free of its restraints. The shredded handcuffs tore deep gashes on Rockwell’s wrists and ankles, but again no blood came from the wounds, only a thick black slime.

  “What the hell?” said Wilson.

  “Shoot it in the spine!” said March. “Damn it, listen…”

  The headless corpse moved in a blur, seizing the metal chair from the floor and swinging it like a club. The thick metal legs hit one of the Ronstadt men in the head with a sickening thump, and the soldier collapsed. Wilson managed to shoot Rockwell’s corpse in the stomach, but the thing kept moving. It reached out and seized the neck of a second Ronstadt soldier and twisted, and the man fell dead to the floor. Wilson managed to shoot the headless corpse in the chest twice more, but it was useless. Rockwell’s corpse grabbed Wilson’s neck and killed him.

  It had managed to dispose of all three Ronstadt men in the space of about forty seconds.

  March’s brain flashed through the tactical situation. There had been eight more Graywolves in the hydroponics bay proper, and he had to assume that they had all been compromised.

  That meant the tactical situation was bad. Very, very bad.

  Even as the thought crossed his mind, he heard screams and the sounds of gunfire from the hydroponics bay.

  “Tell me what the hell is happening!” said Heitz. He had produced a pistol from somewhere and was pointing it at nothing in particular.

  “Machinist infiltrator drones,” said March.

  Something clanged on the balcony outside.

  “Heath!” said March. “Secure the door! Quickly!”

  “If there are more of those things outside my men will be trying to get in here,” said Karlman.

  “Your men are already dead,” said March, “and we’re next.”

  Heath ran to the door and locked it, and not a moment too soon. A half-second later there was a booming clang. A fist-shaped dent appeared, followed soon after by another.

  The infiltrator drones were about to bash down the door.

  Though March was more concerned about the one on the other side of the interrogation window.

  “Somebody had better tell me what the hell is going on!” said Heitz.

  March started to answer, but to his surprise, Heath spoke first.

  “Infiltrator drones,” said Heath. “Machinist technology. Someone dosed those Graywolves with infiltrator nanobots before we took them captive. They’re one of the lowest levels of cybernetic drones the Final Consciousness deploys.”

  “That’s where all those holes in the wall came from,” said March, watching Rockwell’s corpse move back and forth. The headless body was moving almost at random, but the head on its metal spider legs was staring right at the window. “The nanobots collect metal molecules to build cybernetic implants in the host bodies, and once they were ready, they killed their hosts and rewrote their DNA. They use the head as a scout and the body as light infantry. Brain and spinal cord serve as CPUs for the cybernetic systems.” Rockwell’s body backed away from the window. “That’s about to come through the window.”

  “What?” said Heitz, backing away to the far wall. If he had dared, March suspected that he would have used Roanna as a human shield. Heath, Bishop, and Karlman all leveled their weapons at the window.

  “It’s going to come through the window and kill us if it can,” said March. “Aim for the head and the spinal column. If we destroy the brain and the spinal cord, the cybernetic components will lose their CPUs and go inert. Get…”

  The body surged forward and smashed into the window with crushing force. The window had been made out of transparent metal, and the impact knocked it from the frame and into the conference room with a ringing clang. The body vaulted through the window and landed between March and the table, while the head skittered up and perched on the window frame, blank white eyes looking over the room.

  March shot the head with his rifle, turning the brain into a smoking black crater. He knew the drones had developed a local network among themselves as soon as the conversion process had finished, which meant they could look out each other’s’ eyes. More to the point, it meant that Rockwell’s head could not guide Rockwell’s body.

  Nevertheless, the body found March with ease.

  Rockwell’s right arm swung towards March’s face with the force of an iron bar. His left arm snapped up and blocked the blow, and even through the cybernetic interface, he felt the impact. Yet the headless body overbalanced, and March sidestepped, hammering his boot heel into the back of the corpse’s leg. The infiltrator drone stumbled and landed flat on its stomach, and March twisted, snapped his rifle up, and held down t
he trigger.

  His first two shots slammed into Rockwell’s back before the corpse reacted. It started to rise, but enough of the spinal column had been destroyed that the drone’s responses time was down. March sprayed three more shots into its back, and the drone went motionless. He supposed he hadn’t technically killed it, but it wouldn’t be getting up ever again.

  More banging came from the door to the balcony.

  “Good shooting,” said Karlman.

  “Thanks,” said March, looking at the door. “But another eight of those things are about to come at us.” He looked at Heitz. “Is there another way out of this room? The ducts, maybe?”

  “I…no, I don’t think so,” said Heitz. He had recovered himself, though he looked on the edge of terror. “This hydroponics bay was cut out of solid rock. The ducts aren’t big enough for the girl, let alone the rest of us. There’s no other way out.”

  Another dent appeared in the door, accompanied by the shriek of stressed metal. Sooner or later the pounding would rip the door right off its hinges, and then they would be swarmed. March could take three or four infiltrator drones in a straight fight, more if he destroyed their heads first. Eight at once would be a quick and painful death.

  The door made a useful bottleneck. Against human opponents, that might have been decisive. Against the infiltrator drones of the Final Consciousness, it would be less of an advantage. It would take three to five hits to the spinal column to stop one of the infiltrator drones, and the only other way to shut down one of those machines of meat was to inflict enough physical damage that it could no longer move.

  March’s eyes flicked around the room, taking inventory of their weapons. He knew what he carried, and what Heath carried. Heitz and Bishop both had pistols, as did Roanna, but he doubted Roanna had ever fired a weapon in anger. Karlman had a more impressive loadout of weaponry, and…

  “Are those shaped grenades?” said March.