by D. Rus
“Segmented shell!” the gunner's voice came across again. “The mothership had released drones before it even exited the shadow. A sub-hive half as big as the mothership at a distance of 2,000 astronomical units. Six minutes until they open fire. Time until sub-hive reaches certain kill distance and becomes a code orange threat to Marat’s load-carrying structures: 23 minutes. Bust your asses, move like comets, but give me two drums of segmented projectiles for each barrel!”
And we did bust our asses, driven by the gunner’s motivation and swearing and the stimulants from the group’s reserve supply. And also by the sweet jingling of energy rubles being added to our accounts, of course.
The Amazonians gave us no bonuses, considering the current battle either a cheat or a bug. Somehow, a rumor spread among us about what exactly we could buy from our descendants for a thousand e-rubles. This included a budget BMW & Komarovs flyer. And if the budget was tripled, it would be enough for a prestigious Lada Galaxy deluxe with an “eternal” Drexler-900 reactor capable of entering outer space.
Shooting down drones hardly earned us any bonuses, even though our points were divided among 70 individuals instead of a two-thousand-member crew. We received but a few gold and silver cards each with agrain of a berkelium isotope encapsulated inside. That was barely enough for a dinner with an undemanding lady. However, our fierce gunner burned the enemy devices by the hundreds, leaving deadly tungsten clouds in the technosentients’ way.
Soon, we had enough e-rubles for an elite cruise, then for studio apartments near industrial districts, then for quite decent three-bedroom apartments in so-so neighborhoods.
We wished we knew whether or not New Moscow still existed. It was an incredible blue planet with purple clouds and an elite habitability index of a 114 percent.
By the time stipulated, we had sent 27 segmentedprojectiles to the surface. After that, the short-range space combat siren barked. My implant felt the micro vibrations as the missiles launched. I head the crackling of rapid-fire AA guns and the active shields getting pierced and shut down. The remainder of the enemy’s defensive space systems went out with ringing sounds interspersed with the low growls of the main caliber cannons.
After 20 seconds of one-way shooting, a sound-and-light signal howled, warning everyone on board to prepare for enemy fire. The old Marat jerked as if in a seizure under the technosentients’ frequent hits.
Kaboom! The left-over projectiles went flying through our chamber. The three-ton shells crushed some of us, shattered the equipment, and mangled the bulkheads.
Kaboom! The loading mechanism got torn off its mount and slid into a far corner.
Kaboom! The clumsily dodging quarantine drone didn’t see the projectile flying at it from behind and was pressed into the deck.
All I could do was howl as I held on to a bulkhead girder with effort, watching group members’ and equipment’s markers go out. I didn’t know which were worse to lose; the soldiers would be resurrected, but the droid was only good for parts now.
After a minute of enemy fire, a welcome silence fell. Then, hissing came across the loudspeakers, followed by heavy breathing and a hacking cough with alarming gurgling sounds. We heard the gunner’s dead-beat voice, “Attack repulsed. A total of 470 heavy and light enemy platforms has been disabled. We have lost another 11 percent of Marat’s mass. Our orbit has changed; impact with New Sevastopol in three weeks. Write off Marat’s DSS and main caliber as salvage. Save yourselves if you can. Thank you, friends! Guards officer Vladimir Pologov out.”
Crestfallen after what I had just seen and heard, I tore myself away from the girder and jumped down. I searched myself for injuries. My head bled, one of my thumbs was bent at an awkward angle, and I was covered with bruises and scratches. In short, I got off cheaply.
Something rustled overhead. Jerking my head up, I saw Lina clinging to that same girder like a cat. We were like animals during an earthquake; our instincts drove us to escape, yet we still ended up near each other.
I held my arms out for her: “Jump, hon, I’ll catch you.”
The girl sniffed in a deprecating way: “Fix your thumb first, hero!”
With that, she easily jumped down. Notwithstanding her sarcastic tone, she walked over to me and gazed into my eyes with sympathy, “Wait, I’ll do it myself.”
I nodded. Sometimes, it’s good to have a mental connection. Some men just walk around and silently endure horrible pain because their pride or stupidity stops them from asking for help. No one appreciates a man’s firmness. But with Lina, I’ve never concealed anything. Whenever I smashed my pinkie on metal, Lina would cry out and shake a fist at me.
While my implant’s field medicine handled the “multiple internal injuries,” I quickly skimmed the logs. We had lost 19 percent of the group. The rest had injuries of varying severity. The droid was done for, irreparable, its cost subtracted from Marat. Our double-pulse-gun turret was intact, praised be the saints. It was suspended on service hoists and rocked like swings with Macarius clinging to it.
Other losses included capsules 0841 and 1179. We considered their owners condemned, and they sure looked like it, being pale and shocked as if they had crawled into the very depths of an enemy dungeon and suddenly realized that they had only one life remaining. No saving, no restarting.
I marked their personal files; protect the boys, keep them off the front lines. Then, I sent them a message informing them of their temporary transfer to the logistics unit. Now, we needed three new regeneration capsules. No one knew where to get them.
The university logs were surpassingly few and uninformative. Perhaps the system had been suppressed by the forcefully downloaded update that was mandatory for all mobilized RE fleet soldiers.
The RE record card delved into every detail, on the contrary. It offered terabytes of statistics, graphics, video systems for both external and internal surveillance, and other such junk. The Fifth Rome’s ISS would study all of it under a microscope if one of us committed an infraction or were even suspected of it. The infraction could be anything from abandoning one’s post to stealing condoms from a neighboring unit’s stock. The digital world of the future had no privacy, and we just had to accept it.
Not that we had any privacy back in the 21st century. It’s just that very few realized it. Security cameras filmed you both indoors and outdoors, internet search engines knew you better than even you yourself, your credit card company kept track of your shopping habits, and your smartphone retrieved your location and contacts. Social network users created highly detailed profiles complete with their photos and a full account of their personal and professional contacts. Everyone who needed this info knew about it and used it skillfully.
I didn’t bother going through the multimedia mess and switched to the account homepage. It read:
RE Space Force Senior Sergeant “Lucky” Paul.
Primary specialty: space fighter pilot.
Post: interservice team commander.
Points on record card: 4199.
Salary: 240 e-rubles per week. Battle coefficient: + 200%.
RusArmyBank personal account balance: 37.413 e-rubles.
Home port: Fifth Rome, Coliseum College.
Home ship: HSC Marat.
I smiled, content. It was very fortunate that we had dived under the mighty wing of the perished empire. Although… was it really perished? If the Amazonians had managed to survive, surely our people had too, being tougher than the overprotected pseudo-Europeans. Our people were okay even if the Hive had passed through the heart of RE, that horde of a squadron occupying nearly a million miles and thinned out by allied fleets and imperial vassals.
The group began to bustle: I heard the survivors laughing nervously and the wounded groaning and swearing. Any implant was capable of a novocaine block, but to hold your own guts falling out of your abdomen is not very pleasant.
Our male nurse fidgeted. He was wounded, but wouldn’t die. He was the second in our group who had never experienced
the delights of the virtual post-mortal existence. I had a feeling that this whole time, our quack doctor had been secretly injecting himself with medicines he had found in various first aid kits, thereby drastically increasing his vitality. Or maybe he was just one of those careful, calculating lucky fellows who always hide from danger behind the backs of fools and daredevils.
Negative selection; too many careful cowards come home from wars. Heroes and brave soldiers always die in the front lines.
I gave the group permission to use any and all of our medicines. I had grown tired of moans and death, and the group deserved fair treatment. Enough manufacturing for stock! I decided.
We passed out food rations, bags of dried berries, bundles of medicinal moss, and pills of various colors. We will survive, friends!
Everything in the casemate was turned upside down. Projectiles were scattered about, the loading mechanism’s base unit was torn out, and the walls were pressed in and filled with holes. At least there was no radiation; the shells’ feedback controller coating boasted an amazing safety factor.
I sent reconnaissance parties into the gaps in the walls. Macarius wept by the remains of the crushed quarantine droid. I stopped for a second to ruffle his hair and grieve for the poor old droid.
Sniffling, Macarius hurriedly dug through the pile of scrap metal. He gave a cry of joy as he pulled out a small orange box with optical fiber cords dangling from it: “Its personality crystal and memory units! They seem to be intact, although the box’s armor is a mere one tenth of an inch thick. I’ll find him a new body, may I, Commander?”
I nodded as I hurriedly turned away, feeling that I was about to shed a few tears. Why amidst all this death and post-apocalyptic depression was I so touched by the boy’s affection for the droid?
The reconnaissance parties started to report back; the new areas were very small. We now had access to the personal cabins of the casemate team and the technical service module of ammo supply systems. As for loot, a few insignificant freebies awaited us, but nothing interesting, as one might expect from a noob location. Dozens if not hundreds of decks separated us from armories, storehouses, and heavy infantryman barracks.
I squinted as I studied the new hole in the ceiling. Because the loading mechanism’s base unit had gotten ripped out, we now had access to the bore shaft. Its width was impressive. Fortunately, the caliber was determined not by a shell’s physical size, but by its magnetic field generated by its giant rings of rare-earth metals. Therefore, the shaft’s cross-section measured at least three feet.
Murom sat down next to me, pale as a sheet. He had also gotten promoted to sergeant and was now holding his broken arm. The wound was bad; the bones stuck out, and the soft tissues were a mess. But I knew that his implant could handle it.
The sweat on Murom’s brow indicated that he didn’t allow his implant to fully block his pain. He wanted to be fully conscious, which was worthy of respect.
Looking up at that same hole, he gave me a mistrustful look, “I don't even want to know what you have in mind.”
I smiled crookedly: “But you will. The situation has changed. Marat will fall into a gravity well in three weeks. Don’t ask me how it’s freaking possible; the university’s first course is supposed to last a year and a half. Let’s just work with what we have. We need to reach the flight deck asap!”
Murom wiped sweat off his brow and uttered through is teeth, “Where will this tunnel lead us? Directly to the hangars? Could it be?”
“No, that would’ve been too simple. The shaft passes right through the ship’s central axis and is part of the primary structure. In theory, it could provide access to ten internal modules at most, each being 30 decks apart. It’s protection from wise guys like us. To jump from level one to level 30 is nothing more than fancy suicide. It’s not even a cheat, it’s just stupid.”
Murom only shook his head: “So are we wise or stupid?”
I didn’t answer right away, passing my vacant gaze over the group – possibly the Russian Empire’s last warriors. Finally, I replied, my voice so menacing that Murom raised a brow, “They shouldn’t have driven us into a corner. Even a rat can kill a human under such circumstances. And we’re men of the 21st century, direct descendants and heirs of the Great Empire. Not some overprotected gay aristos from a faraway colony, and not some wretched girls pumped with artificial testosterone playing badass infantrymen. Besides, we don’t have a choice. Seventy decks separate us from the hangars. At first, we were given three days per deck, which is already awfully little. Only half the units pass on the first try. But now, we most certainly need unconventional moves.”
Murom shrugged, “Doesn’t hurt to try. Worst case scenario, we’ll make a gun-port in the shaft and shoot anyone we see with our dual plasma gun. We’ll get hefty bonuses for our insolence, then return to our level of competency.”
“OK. We’ll develop this plan further. We, the staff, together with our implants will fine-tune the details. Today, we rest, remove postmortal debugs, scour the adjacent locations for loot, and burn our bridges. I’m granting permission to open tactical supplies of tasty snacks and give everyone a commissary shot of vodka. Get to it!”
In 12 hours, our best soldiers stood before a homemade access ramp which led to the shaft. We had given our storm troopers the best gear, not stinting on anything. That way, instead of giving everyone a tiny bit, we had concentrated all the armor and weapons into a single striking force.
It was more than enough for a noob location. The warriors were in spacesuits or light CASs covered with additional shields. Everyone had a light firearm and steampunk-style blades. We also had additional protection in the form of ugly patches of armor plates which we had taken off the crushed droids. With a little luck, they could easily save us. They did, however, adversely affect our mobility. But I was the only one sort of capable of dodging plasma beams given my special Alpha-prime implant, and flaunting this ability would’ve been unwise. Who knows if I would yet have to duel someone or get forcefully demoted? I like to surprise my enemies and have some trump cards up my sleeve.
Although I went with them as the commander, Murom led the formation. He had already gone more than 24 hours without dying and looked philosophically upon a minute in the virtual purgatory. I was second to last in the formation; the leader had to be preserved till the last moment.
We were followed by Nika, our outsentry. She drove eight zerg drones.
Two gunners, Nicholas and Cat, covered Nika. They, in turn, were followed by the heavy arms group – Lina and Macarius who dragged the double PG on special hardware. Their assistant was loaded with heaps of ammo; a mix of 15,000 different balls. He also carried a portable armored shield in case the PGs would have to be used in a stationary position.
The young man groaned but said nothing, not wanting to waste time on complaints. His 150-pound burden pulled him down toward the center of Marat’s artificial gravity. And we still had to go up the shaft some 160 feet. That’s like climbing a 16-story building. A ladder of neodymium rings is no elevator shaft. Falling off is super easy. Thus, I gave an order; if you fall, do it quietly so as not to betray the group as we stole through foreign territory. The group weren’t crazy about my order.
We set off. Our mechanics had woven ladder steps for us out of the magnetic coils they had cut open. It was super-hard work for which they were rewarded with extra points on their RCs and my personal gratitude recorded into their accounts. A commander’s gratitude was not some useless scrap of paper, but a significant bonus.
Slowly yet persistently we crawled upward. It wasn’t easy in spacesuits; we were far from having maximum physical stats. Our muscles grew slowly, adding only half an inch per week to our biceps. The maximum weight we could lift increased by one percent every 24 hours.
The zerg bots clattered quietly over our heads. They scanned all available frequency ranges. Occasionally, their keen sensors detected the vibrations of faraway shooting and the echo of explosions. But I wasn
’t worried. The supporting structures of the mile-long Marat were so thick that it was practically impossible to break into a shaft without heavy armament.
Although, there were spots where the construction workers had done a botchy job or used materials sparingly, covering the shaft with nothing but the armor of adjacent special modules.
And our destination was precisely one such module. The ACC, alternate control center. It was an armored cocoon with a double sluicing system and a suspiciously convenient hidden service hatch to the accelerator shaft.
Could it be that it wasn’t a designer's mistake, but a hidden evacuation and transportation means for high-ranking officers in the event of boarding or mutiny? Alas, we had no access to any officer documents or learning guides, so we could only guess.
Nika stopped abruptly, secured both legs and an arm in the ladder’s loops, and pointed up with her free hand: “There’s a skirmish in the ACC. It’s a dense battle, almost critically dense. Their barrels are even melting. Oh, and, Sir, I’m picking this up via the bots’ mics. Judging by the orders they’re giving, one of the battling parties are our old acquaintances, the seventh company psi-snipers. I would recognize Livia Cruise’s husky porn-star voice anywhere.”
Chapter Fifteen
Heavy Spacecraft Carrier Marat. Alternate Control Center (system efficiency: 3.6%, habitability index: 42%). Seventh company psi snipers’ capture flag mounted.
Junior sergeant Livia Cruise, recently demoted because of the disastrous decline of her unit’s rank, wiped the blood out of her eye and, checking her tactical map, hurriedly whispered an order into the seventh company’s local chat: “Epsilon squad, take the last roboturret and run to the radial hall! Platoon two is used up. Delta squad, entrench the chart house! Platoon three will retreat through there. Intercept the pursuit and hang on as long as you can. Use all the mines you have. Alpha will respawn in two hours and help you.”