Exodus: Machine War: Book 4: Retribution

by Doug Dandridge

  * * *

  “We have forty-seven Machine missiles still on course to intercept with Klassek, General.”

  “Can we get them?” asked Wittmore, looking at the tactical plot and realizing the question he had just asked made no sense. They could try to get them all. They could hope to get them all. But there was no way they could guarantee success.

  “We’re launching now,” said the Fleet captain who was in charge of the largest space station in orbit around Klassek, that which was the control center for planetary defense.

  Klassek had become one of the most heavily defended worlds in the Empire, even though it was one of the newest. All three of the larger stations in orbit had multiple counter missile tubes and heavy beam batteries. There were over a hundred defense satellites in close and medium orbit, massing several hundred thousand tons each, with scores of counters, one particle beam and two laser rings on every one. Now all of those assets were aligned in orbit on the side of the planet facing the missile swarm, sensors locking on as best they could while beam weapons powered up to their maximum load.

  Thousands of counters left their cells and tubes within seconds of each other, heading out and accelerating at twenty thousand gravities. Against slow targets every one would get a hit, unless it was taken out by weapons on the incoming missile. The missiles were coming in at point seven-seven light, difficult targets to engage, and they were the larger Machine weapons, each carrying defensive beams and their own counter missiles.

  The first wave of counters cut the incoming missiles by half. Another launch took out all but five, which were seconds from hitting the planet. Every beam weapon in orbit reached out, making contact with all of the weapons, most for an insufficient time to do much more than vaporize an infinitesimal amount of its mass. Four Machine weapons were hit by enough beams that the cumulative effect was to vaporize large parts of their hulls, sending them off on angles that would not intersect the planet. Three exploded into plasma. And one missile came on, to strike the largest of the stations, converting itself and most of the multimillion ton space station into plasma. Tens of thousands of people went with it into oblivion.

  Wittmore watched as the station disappeared from the plot along with the last missile. He was about to cheer that the planet had been saved, when the enormity of the loss to his own people hit. Tens of thousands of more people killed defending Klassek, which seemed to be a magnet drawing in the Machines. Including many people he had worked with for over a year.

  “Is it over?” asked President Contera over the com moments later.

  “Yes, Mr. President,” said the general through gritted teeth. “The planet is safe, for the moment.”

  “Forgive me, General,” said the Klassekian, who had been around humans as much as anyone on his planet, and knew how to recognize their moods. “I know you lost the space fortress, and all of those people aboard. We had people aboard as well. But I had to think of the greater number of my people first, most, always.”

  “I know, sir. And it is also my job to keep this planet and its people safe. But, all of the Imperial military on the planet and in orbit are my responsibility.”

  “Are we still at risk from their small machines, General?”

  Wittmore thought about that for a moment. In the recent past the Machines had released an invasion of their factory modules that had fallen onto the planet and launched their own invasion. It had taken a lot of effort to get rid of them, at the cost of millions of lives. But he thought they had the measure of the Machines this time.

  “We’ll keep our people on alert, Mr. President. If anything comes down we’ll be on them before they’re prepared. I’m not about to see them establish another foothold on this world.”

  * * *

  The survivors of the Klassekian system defense force, the ships that Lysenko had taken out to attack the incoming Machine ships, dropped back into normal space. Halliday had been in com link with them through the wormhole the entire way, setting them up to attack the Machines as soon they were back in normal space, but it hadn’t been needed.

  “We need to get your ship back to Bolthole as soon as possible,” said Halliday to the commander who was acting captain of the King Jarvis, the one surviving battleship of that force, still combat capable, barely.

  “And who’s going to guard the system while we’re gone, ma’am?” asked the commander.

  “We’re going to have to fill in for your ship while you’re in the shipyard,” said Halliday, thinking of the tensions this was going to cause Bednarczyk when she realized the force she had temporarily detached was not coming back as fast as she would have wanted.

  “Yes, ma’am. We’ll unload the wormhole as soon as we get insystem.”

  Halliday thought for a moment. She would have two wormholes, as well as the gate. Probably enough to hold the system unless the Machines sent a massive force her way. And she would depend on Admiral Bednarczyk to make sure that no other large forces would head in this direction.

  She herself would have preferred to have headed back to Machine space, where the big show was still going on. Unfortunately, her orders had come from the top, the Chief of Naval Operations herself. And she had doubts that that was where the orders had originated.

  “Begin bringing reloads through the wormhole,” she ordered her people. “I’ll be in conference with the ground pounder officer.”

  Chapter Twenty-one

  I love the name of honor, more than I fear death. Julius Caesar

  GORGANSHA SPACE ON EDGE OF MACHINE SPACE: NOVEMBER 30TH, 1002.

  “We’re picking up a Machine force leaving the system ahead, ma’am,” reported the com officer, relaying the information from one of the forward scouts of the force.

  “Isn’t that one of the Gorgansha systems?” asked Mara Montgomery, a sick feeling in her stomach. She looked at the plot, ordering the information to come up on her implant. She felt the sickness grow as she looked up the vital stats of the world. It was one of the newer colonies of the Gorgansha people, estimated population, thirty million Gorgansha, with about ten million slaves. Mostly a farming world, with some few industrial concerns. A welcoming world with lots of native life, nothing too dangerous, well back on the evolutionary scale from the colonists. Defenses were almost nonexistent. And there would only be one reason that a Machine force would be leaving that system.

  “Send all our hyper VII ships, including this ship and its escorts, on an intercept course,” she ordered after a moment’s thought. “I want that group blown out of space. Hyper VI ships are to continue on into the system without us. If there’s anyone left alive there, I want them helped and protected.”

  The Machine force, fifty-three ships, were in hyper VI, boosting at maximum to get away from the human ships they had detected. They would not escape from the hyper VII warships, which closed quickly on them. The Machines ships, without fear or any other motivated emotions, continued on with mechanical fatalism. The VII ships swept by them, decelerating in order to drop missiles down to the lower dimension and hit them from the sides. For fear that they might have enough ships with graviton beam projectors to drop some of her ships catastrophically out of hyper, Mara kept her ships well away. As a couple of dozen of the missiles they fired dropped off the plot she realized she had made the right decision. Hundreds of missiles got through, though, since the enemy ships couldn’t cover more than a few of the angles of approach. Half the Machine ships dropped off the plot, along with many missiles taken out by the enemy’s close in defenses.

  The ships were going slow enough to jump down to the lower dimension, which they did as soon as they were past. Streams of wormhole launched missiles then slammed into the Machine force, obliterating it.

  “Destroyer squadrons three and four are ordered to drop into normal space and make sure nothing survived,” Mara ordered over the com. The twenty designated vessels dropped down into normal space and started to decelerate at their maximum rate. They would come back and sweep the a
rea with active sensors, destroying any significant Machine wreckage they could find. The Machines might have been destroyed by the catastrophic translations, or some might have survived. Non-organic intelligences were tough, and Mara saw no reason to take any chances while she had the time to track them down.

  “Commodore Braxis is reporting they have dropped into normal space outside the system, ma’am. No sign of life.”

  “No signals?” asked Montgomery, the sick feeling returning.

  “No signs of life, ma’am. The habitable planet no longer is.”

  “By the Goddess, no.” But she had known what was coming. The Machines would only have been on the way out if they had finished what they came to do, exterminate all life in the system.

  “Show me,” ordered Mara, not really wanting to see what awaited in the system, duty bound to look at it.

  The images on the holo were as horrific as she thought they would be. A once living world turned into a lava field, fresh craters glowing on the small moon. An image of an interplanetary liner, a great melted rip from bow to stern, floated in the holo. It had probably been taking people hoping to get away to some kind of safety, but it wasn’t to be.

  Everyone dead, she thought, her ill feeling giving way to rage.

  “We’re receiving signals from the asteroid belt, ma’am. There are survivors.”

  The words sunk in. There are survivors. How many out of the tens of millions who had been alive days before?

  “Send ships to those signal sources. I want them to pick up those survivors and…”

  “We’re picking up another Machine force, ma’am. Moving toward us in hyper VII.”

  “How many?” she asked, in her mind striking out at the enemy and tearing them apart.

  “Two hundred and fifty-three so far, ma’am.”

  “By the Goddess.” Mara looked at the com officer in shock. That was larger than her own force, and all of them were hyper VII. If she met them in hyper they would have the advantage over her forty-nine hyper VII ships, and a much greater advantage over her ninety-one VI vessels. And she currently had twenty of her hyper VII ships, destroyers, sweeping normal space.

  “All ships to the system,” she ordered. “Send message to destroyer squadrons on search and destroy. They are to stop in space and lay low. After the enemy passes and is in stair step approach, they are to jump back up to hyper VII and maneuver outside the system.” That should catch the enemy’s attention, and the Machines wouldn’t be able to do anything about them for some time. While she was making enough noise to lure them into the system, where she would have the advantages over them due to her wormhole launchers.

  After she had gotten all of her ships into normal space she started setting up her ambush. After a short consult with her tactical people, she decided that an ambush such as those pulled on the Cacas would probably work very well here. From the current information from Klassek the Machines might not translate right at the barrier, so she made sure everyone was ready to strike them no matter where they came out. That done, she arranged her ships, which spent a half an hour accelerating and decelerating and getting set, then going cold, waiting for the Machines to come in. And if they came in like they tended to do, they would find a surprise waiting for them.

  * * *

  The Machine flagship, that on which rode the designated AI controlling the fleet, decided that the humans would be best attacked quickly. It would give them no time to organize, but would come into the system and fire on everything they could acquire with their superior processing speed. This system had been marked for the extermination of all life, and since it didn’t know if the first force to come here had accomplished its mission, or if they had been destroyed by these humans before they could complete the system, it would plan for that as well. Once they destroyed the human fleet they could make sure all life was wiped clean from the system.

  As they were halfway into the stair step procedure, just into hyper III, they picked up the hyper signatures of twenty human ships behind them, well away from the system. From the signatures they were small ships, the ones the humans used for escort duty. They were determined to not be a threat at the moment, though they could be the scouts of a larger force. Too far into the entry pathway, and not willing to waste any more time, the Machine fleet continued in, set to jump, as usual, at the last moment before hitting the barrier, again saving time.

  As soon as they jumped into normal space, within seconds of each other as each got in close proximity to the barrier, they detected the thirty-seven vessels in front of them, all firing as soon as they had targets. There were other ship traces from within the system, in positions where the Machines couldn’t do nothing about them for the time being. They started to lock onto the human ships ahead, getting ready to fire. That was when they detected the missiles coming in from behind at point nine-five light, followed by a swarm of missiles accelerating at fifteen thousand gravities. And the controlling processor knew it had stepped into a trap it couldn’t escape. Which didn’t mean it wouldn’t fight back while it could.

  * * *

  Mara didn’t have to give an order. Everyone in her command knew what to do. The only order she had to give before the Machines jumped into normal space was ‘fire at them until they’re all destroyed.’ And that was what her command did. The ones in front fired at the same time all the wormhole launchers in her force, seven of them, released their first streams from behind. All the attention was paid to the ships in front. The Machines fired, then detected the incoming wormhole missiles, at the same time as the outer force shot from every tube they had. The Machines reacted quickly, as always, but a third of the wormhole missiles made it through, and Fifty-four Machine vessels turned into expanding clouds of plasma. The rest fired, and the missile duel was on.

  Montgomery sat back in her chair, not really caring about herself for the moment, feeling no fear, no anxiety, only anger at the dead things that had destroyed this living system. All she had in her was rage, and she was going to feed it while watching the bastards cease to exist.

  Two more wormhole launches struck the Machines before any of the conventionally launched missiles hit a target. Thirty-four more Machines vessels converted to plasma. Then the fast accelerating human missiles hit, and all but eleven of the Machine ships were destroyed. They finally got some hits of their own just as the last of their ships were disappearing into superheated gaseous matter.

  Mara nodded her head in satisfaction, her anger somewhat mollified. She had lost some ships, each of them containing from hundreds to thousands of sets of hopes and dreams. Those hurt her. But overriding that was the satisfaction that these murder machines would no longer roam the galaxy.

  “I want this space swept completely. I want anything larger than ten centimeters to be vaporized. Am I understood?”

  Acknowledgments came from all around, and she got up from her seat and headed to the hatch. She thought she would visit the Unitarian shrine aboard ship, and pray to her Goddess. Much life had been lost here, life sacred to her deity. And she would pray for forgiveness for her part in that tragedy.

  Chapter Twenty-two

  What enables us to achieve our greatness contains the seeds of our destruction. Jim Valvano

  GORGANSHA HOME WORLD: DECEMBER 8TH, 1002.

  “Move,” yelled the Gorgansha security guard, kicking the leg of the tall and ungainly alien that was slowing the line of slaves. The alien grunted and turned to look at the guard, red eyes glaring with murderous intent. The other slaves started to become agitated as the other guards reached for their stun rods.

  “Look away, private,” said the Marine officer, scowling. This was a different private, but it looked as if the result might be the same. Wilkins was confined to ship, having lost some pay and the chance of promotion for his actions. It could have been worse, she imagined, and she didn’t want worse this time.

  The tall alien looked right at Samantha, the eyes going from rage filled to imploring in an instant. The
guard hit it in the midsection with his stun rod, which must have been on low power since it didn’t make him double over. Before the guard could make another move the slave grabbed him by the wrist and jerked upwards with awesome strength, hurling the guard away, then jumping on the back of another who was watching the line of slaves.

  In an instant it was bedlam, as the thousand or more slaves swarmed the less than thirty security guards under. A few got off shots, and one slave dropped with a gruesome wound to the head. One guard, the officer, looked over at Samantha before he was picked up and slammed to the ground.

  Your problem, thought the Marine officer, looking coldly at the Gorgansha male. They were here to look after the safety of Imperial spacers and technicians, not to keep the slaves in line.

  All of the slaves started screaming in pain and terror, hands going to heads.

  “What the hell is happening to them?” asked one of the Marines.

  “They have discipline implants,” said the lieutenant. “Marines. Back away. I want us out of here before the Gorgansha strike back at them.”

  One of the slaves pulled something off the dead overseer’s belt and waved it at his head, immediately calming, then waving it at the others, moving slowly down the line.

  “He’s disabling their implants,” yelled out the platoon sergeant.

  “Keep moving,” yelled back Samantha, waving for her people to get away from the revolt. Now explosions were going off in the distance, and she suspected that the revolt was no longer local.