Onyx Javelin

by Steve Wheeler

  'OK, Marko. Look behind us. The predators are not that far away. I wonder how they will react to us shooting up their prey?'

  'Don't know, Lily. Depends if they treat them as a fun hunt or a food source. If we kill them and they don't have to get in harm's way to get the food, I don't think that they will care. If they are capable of caring.'

  Marko watched as Lily started to fire at the Urchins that had landed on the stricken Games Board frigate and were stabbing their eighty-metre-long, barbed tails deep into the ship and then twisting and ripping the hull plates off. The Hanger that Lily was piloting was firing a steady stream of munitions into the core parts of the Urchin. As they struck, they flattened themselves and spun before exploding, creating large cone-shaped wounds. She switched from one Urchin to the next, damaging each before she flashed over the top of the frigate.

  The third Urchin had flattened itself against the frigate and had its tail deep inside the craf t as Lily gave an update.

  'The front on the frigate is separating! Looks like they are abandoning their drive systems. Break off, Marko. Major, are you getting any messages from the Games Board? I wonder if they have lost control of their antimatter storage?'

  'Stand by!'

  Marko fired his lateral thrusters, knowing that Lily was rarely wrong, and peeled away from the frigate, then poured on the power to the main rockets, distancing himself as quickly as possible. Calculating quickly, he saw that Lily and the rest of his crewmates were outside the possible danger area and that he only had to worry about himself.

  'They have ejected their core AI!' the major yelled. 'And this is weird. The predators are legging it as well. They are moving away towards the other Urchins.'

  They all saw on their screens a lance-like structure launch itself at huge speed away from the frigate, and seconds later the crew survival pods started to be ejected.

  'All craft,' Patrick broadcast. 'Message from the Games Board frigate emergency pods. They have lost control of the antimatter containments. All shields up. Detonation imminent!'

  Marko tapped the end of one of his hand controls and the shield quickly slid over the transparent parts of his canopy. The onboard computer automatically covered the rear-facing cameras an instant before the slowly tumbling frigate was annihilated by the massive, almost all-consuming, silent explosion. He pressed his lips together, hoping that the core AI lance, which would contain the crew's Soul Saver continuous life-streams, survived. Although he had never really liked the Games Board or anything it stood for, he had known several Games Board individuals in his past that he cared for.

  He also anxiously looked at his readouts, hoping that the gamma-ray burst generated by the explosion had been stopped by the Skua's shielding.

  Ascertaining it was within acceptable limits, he breathed a sigh of relief and tapped on a side-screen, instructing his onboard computers to open the covers of the windshield and the rear-facing cameras. Seconds after the covers slid open the proximity alarms started screeching out their warnings and he looked in horror as a very fast-moving, massive, jagged piece of wreckage smashed into the Skua. As it rolled over the forward part of the craf t's fuselage, it tore the canopy off plus most of the instrument panel and part of the nose cone.

  Something hit him hard on the top of his helmet, stunning him for a few seconds and he could taste blood in his mouth. As the craft was flipped over, starting to cartwheel, his helmet HUD alarms began sounding with just about every system showing damage. His suit visor automatically sealed and his seat locked him in more firmly. He automatically sped himself up as his hands, feet and mind went into overdrive to assess the damage, his trajectory and what systems he could use to slow the sickening tumbling. He also commanded his suit to drop some antinausea meds into his system, knowing that puking into his helmet would not help his situation. Gradually, he managed to slow the cartwheeling and allowed himself a minute to assess the damage.

  His starboard wing had been torn almost in half so all the water fuel on that side was lost together with his starboard weapons. He quickly went through his lists, shutting down systems that were only partially functional, then suddenly realised that his comms systems must also be down as he had not heard anything from anyone. There was a thudding bang that he felt through the rear of the seat and all remaining systems went dead. Wondering how much worse things could get, and cursing the fact that most of the redundant systems were also down, he reluctantly pulled up his internal medical systems, activated his oxygenated blood nanotes and stopped breathing.

  Looking out through the wreckage of his cockpit, he saw Basalt, kilometres to his left, firing on a huge Urchin that had predator spheres tearing chunks off it. Many kilometres in the opposite direction, he saw what must have been a huge fight going on as a part of the sky was constantly being lit by laser fire and the sparkle of munitions going off. But in spite of his scanning the starfield he could see nothing of Lily. The best that he could hope for was that she had taken off in pursuit of the Games Board AI lance. Then he had the sickening realisation that the asteroid was looming up in his forward vision field quite quickly and he probably did not have the time to get control of the Skua. He tried a last series of firings of the main rockets, but every time he did, although the velocity slowed, he also started tumbling more rapidly; he figured that the nozzles themselves were almost certainly damaged. Furiously working the firing sequences, he managed to slow the tumbling to a more manageable, almost sedate state.

  Cursing loudly, he looked around the ruined cockpit for the last time, reached out and snatched the carbine and ammunition drums, attaching them to his chest, and hit the ejection system. Nothing happened. He pulled the overrides out of the sides of the seat and pressed the button on the seat's control board. Still nothing. He struggled against the seat and its tough restraints, which held him firm. He reached down the seat with his left hand and extended a data probe from one of his fingers, connecting directly to the seat. Seeing in his helmet's HUD that no electrical circuits were active, he fed a little power from his combat suit into the seat's control board, which came alive just long enough for the seat to fold back a little.

  Pulling hard against the seat, he managed to pull himself free, stood up and looked aft down the torn and broken back of the Skua, trying to orientate himself in the tumbling craft. He swore again to himself and looked over his shoulder. Marko saw the looming asteroid and calculated that his speed would be about 350 kilometres an hour and that he only had a few minutes before the Skua would impact. The very best scenario, thinking about the trajectory, was that it would be struck a glancing blow.

  The soldier in him demanded that he push himself away from the battered craf t and give himself a chance at survival, while the engineer in him coolly assessed the situation, knowing the antigravity unit, being an inertial system, would push him out of the way ... if he had time to get it to work. He also knew that he stood a much better chance of surviving the day if he was still with the Skua. He scrambled aft hand over hand, observing the absene of most of the sheathing of the upper hull, so he simply looked down on the antigravity unit and its compact engineering control panel. On its readouts it showed that it had latent power in its emergency cells, which would normally be enough to soft-land the Skua on a one gravity world.

  He pulled himself down against the unit, curving his body to it with his head sticking up enough to see the looming asteroid. He reached down with his left hand, pulled up the command menus in his head and plugged himself directly into the antigravity unit. He experimented by powering the unit when he could not see the asteroid and rapidly counting in his still sped-up state. Knowing he was having an effect, he stood up for a rotation of the Skua and decided that it was probably going to miss. Marko frowned, tried his comms gear unsuccessfully for the twentieth time, then pulled himself out onto the wing and gently pushed himself up off it. He pulled the carbine off his chest, slammed the magazine onto it, cocked it and fired a round, allowing the recoil to push him further a
way from his craf t. When he judged that he was thirty metres away he turned and fired again to keep himself in a good position. Using a few more carefully aimed shots, he found himself almost stationary in relation to the slowly tumbling Skua as they both snuck over the surface of the asteroid with twenty metres to spare.

  He pushed the rifle against his chest and fired again, then safed it and clipped it back onto his chest before flipping himself with arms and legs extended and, moments later, grabbing the remains of the right-side wing, allowing it to pull him over until he was once again tumbling head over heels with the machine. He pulled himself back against the antigravity unit and spent fifteen minutes slowly bringing the tumbling under control. Eventually, it slowed almost to a stop so he allowed himself a few breaths from the suit's internal C02 scrubbers. He pulled himself forwards into the wreck of a cockpit, manually slid the seat forwards and pulled the zero gravity, zero atmosphere survival pack out, plugging his combat suit into it and allowing the systems to recharge after he had activated the pack's emergency locator beacon. While that was happening, he pulled out his own personal diagnostic slate, which was in his crew bag behind the seat, plugged it in and brought up the Skua's systems by rerouting some of the power from the antigravity unit. Af ter another fifteen minutes and a further eighty-seven kilometres from the asteroid, he finally saw what was available to him.

  Working at a steady pace, he pulled one of the comms units out of the port-side rotary cannon, slaved it to the antigravity unit as well as to his suit comms, then filled his lungs with air and spoke: 'Basalt, this is Marko. Do you copy?'

  The major replied instantly. 'Hurray! You are still alive. We're in a total shitfight. Can see your beacon. You onboard still?'

  'Affirmative. ETA? Others?'

  'Could be another hour or more. On top of these bastards, but it's a good fight. Drone dispatched. All OK so far. Basalt out.'

  The connection severed and Marko wished he knew exactly what was happening, but was relieved that every zero-g pilot's worst nightmare of having to self-terminate because of exhausted consumables would probably not come to pass.

  A sudden chill went down his spine. He disconnected from the survival pack, pulled himself forwards again and pulled out the little remote control from the base of the remaining rotary cannon. He dipped that against his wrist, then went back down the intact port side of the Skua and did the same with the rapid-firing mortar housed inside the annular wing. He then pulled himself up over the top of the machine and looked at the linear rifles on the starboard side. They appeared to be OK, but to be certain he opened a few of the surface panels, looking at the magazines and ammunition feeds. Shrugging to himself, he started back towards the cockpit and caught a distortion against the starfield to his right. He shuddered, recognising that an Urchin was within a few hundred metres of the Skua and hopefully being cautious about investigating it.

  Moving slowly into the cockpit he plugged himself into the survival pack, instructed it to form around him, then slowly pushed the ejection seat as far forwards as it would go and climbed into the space behind it. He activated the pack as it inflated around him with all its systems coming fully online. Its high-powered minicomputer searched for anything useful still onboard the Skua to ensure the comfort and survival of its occupant, then awakened the little engineering drone. Marko tapped an icon on the main display on the inside of the pack,. then scrolled down the list a short way before tapping on the threat icon for an Urchin. He brought up the available power packs and instructed the survival pack to reroute the power to the weapons and any working sensors before plugging the remotes into his own slate. He worried whether he had enough time, knowing that the Urchin would be close.

  The screen cleared and an instant later the remaining sensors showed the probable location and size of the creature. Tapping the mortar icon, he loaded a stream of five oxygen/ hydrogen projectiles with self-igniters and gave the order to fire. He felt the weapon firing the big slow rounds and had the rotary ready to follow through. He did a slow count to eight, then the rounds exploded and a second later the incendiaries at their core detonated, igniting the oxygen and hydrogen in five silent fireballs within striking distance of the Urchin. It suddenly manifested, having dropped its camouflage, and Marko could see that it was quite young. It folded into itself in an action that Marko knew from previous experience was one of defeat, so he did not fire again, but kept a wary eye out for any further movement.

  He wondered what else might be around, very concerned that there were a number of blind spots around the damaged machine that the remaining sensors could not cover. He reactivated the antigravity and, after a couple of gentle nudges, managed to get the Skua to slowly roll, to go with the tumbling it was still doing. Minutes later, the sensors showed three more much larger Urchins coming towards him. He grimaced, shook his head, programmed the mortar and fired a burst of homing shells at one and repeated the action with the other two. As soon as the rounds detonated, the wounded Urchins reacted by flipping themselves around, firing their own propellants and scattering.

  'Fuck!' Marko laughed, wondering if he would see the day out after all.

  He keyed his microphone. 'Basalt, this is Marko. Sending Soul Saver. Going for life-stream. This is bad!'

  He instructed the emergency system to transfer his conscious self to the data banks on Basalt.

  Seeing the transfer in progress, he relaxed a little, knowing that even if he died his own self would carry on.

  The major's voice came through. 'Good. But perhaps today is not your next time in the tank, Marko. I am shoving two drones very close to you. Just hold on a little longer, mate.'

  He stopped the transfer of the last conscious part of his soul and waited with his finger on the icon, knowing that if he pushed it, it would drain the last of the power in the Skua in transmitting his self. He had done the process twice before in his life and hated it. But it sure beat death, he thought, remembering the last time: the lifting away from his dying body by the harsh pseudo-heat of the electronics, to feel himself in his Soul Saver, conscious, with no abilities but thought; then the transfer to the zygote, the tank, and the year of intense concentration growing himself back to an adult body. He shuddered at the thought, wondering if this time he would ask for a chassis for a while, before the tank. He mentally shrugged, knowing how horribly cold and clinical existence inside the robot chassis would be.

  The screens showed the three Urchins slowly closing in and behind them, like avenging angels, the two drones which started firing from a long way out. Marko grinned, shunted power back to the rotary cannon and joined in with incendiary rounds that detonated on the Urchins, targeting the area where the long tail met the flowerlike upper structure, filling it with white-hot spinning shards. As the ammunition counted down, he activated the linear guns and had just started to fire when the magazine exploded. The concussion knocked him sideways, wedging the very tough survival pack against the seat. Quickly looking at the screens, he saw that the explosion had damaged the pack, which he was not surprised about, but more critically had knocked out the last of the power systems. He cursed, instructing his oxygenated bloodstream nanotes to take over from his breathing again, then deflated the slowly leaking survival pack. He grabbed the oxygen bottles and comms system from it and locked them onto his suit, climbing back onto the top of the Skua once more just in time to see one of the Urchins enfold and tear apart one of the drones. 'It automatically self-destructed, killing the Urchin from within.

  He looked around to see the remaining drone in a fierce battle with the other two Urchins. 'Itappeared to be getting the upper hand until one of the Urchins lashed out, driving it into the other Urchin, which impaled it on its long, spiky vicious tail. The tail slowly lif ted the drone up towards its massive roselike head and its many mouths bit down into the flat fish shaped structure of the drone. Marko wished hard that the machine would also self-destruct, but it did not happen. He mentally swore long and hard.

  Har
ry suddenly spoke through his earphones. 'Marko! Know where you are. Can see that the drones are gone. Need to rearm, huge fight going on. Hang tight, my brother. No-one lost yet, but all messed up. We're pulling back onto Basalt. Will be there within the hour.'

  Marko quickly acknowledged, then said to himself, 'Fuck it!' He pulled himself left and forwards, snapped open all the hatches to the magazines of the rotary cannon, hit the quick releases of the weapon itself and pulled it out, connected the remote control back on, then, pulling it behind him, moved along the port side of the Skua until he came to the access panels for the life raf t. He locked a tie onto the gun, pulled himself under the cockpit to where the starboard-side magazines were; unlocked the covers, pulled the magazines out, dipped them together and went back to the life raf t. He dragged it out, activated it and reached inside to take the power cord from the water and nutrient maker, and plug it into the gun. Having a sudden thought, he pulled the recoil dampeners away from the weapon and grabbed the tie-downs from the life raf t after climbing inside it. He latched himself onto the gun, brought up the controls and, mentally giggling at the madness of it all, oriented himself and the gun to face away from the area of sky that the asteroid was in and fired a long continuous burst using half of the ammunition available to him.

  Looking back at the rapidly receding wreck of the Skua, he saw the two Urchins slowly enfold it, pulling it apart, looking for anything that they could consume.

  Marko and his strange carriage drifted through the heavens as his mind wandered, taking in the beauty of it, and he felt a kind of peace. He instructed his biosystem to start breathing to recharge the nanotes, then shut his natural intake of oxygen off again, knowing that he had days of oxygen available to him

  as his suit would scrub any C02 and his augmented system would use only the bare minimum necessary. He looked

  around for the asteroid, frowned when he could not see it, so pulled out his slate, plugged it into his arm and queried its navigation systems. Having little or no gas in his lungs, he made a very poor imitation of a grunt, seeing that he was way off-course, so changed the magazine feed to the gun, oriented himself and fired off half of the contents.