by Tobias Roote
“Arty? Stand by to jump me out if the door blows, meanwhile I’m going to try and ensure that XeraC’s success is limited.”
“Alright Ossie, but don’t leave it too long, we have incoming here as well and I might be too busy to jump you soon,” Arty responded through his comms speaker.
Osbourne had temporarily forgotten the invasion fleet. He concentrated on furiously typing. As Jenari source flashed up on the screen he took chunks of it and re-wrote, or deleted it. Ten minutes went by and he was just about finished when he glanced at the monitor with the camera feed and saw the attention of one of the men at his door - plastic explosive. It would blow in a second.
“OK, XeraC, it appears you have won this round, but don’t think you are going to have it all your own way.” Osbourne smiled grimly.
“Sedal? I have created a safe place for you to operate from - it’s completely off-limits to anything without your signature. You have free access to the whole of the Habitat. It won’t be fantastic, but you will survive and be able to thwart XeraC at every turn if you keep yourself out if his reach. Go here.” Osbourne indicated a position on the main server that had turned black and unreadable to the CCC server.
“I’m transferring now. Thank you Ossie, I will safeguard the humans from this abomination as much as I can,” Sedal spoke as he left the backup unit.
“I have left a few more surprises for him,” Osbourne informed him.
With the last few seconds before the door was blown in, Osbourne left a single line of text that would show on every single vidscreen throughout the ARK.
***
As the electricity began humming in the tunnel they could hear it switching to the emitters to power the repellers, Scott who lagged behind the others, leaped out of the tunnel before he was dragged into the centre and held immobile. He rushed through the intersecting corridor catching up quickly with the others at the door of the Command & Control Centre.
“Quickly Scott,” Wilkes called out, “before the sentry AI gets back on-line and activates the door’s defences.”
As expected it was locked. Scott pumped six blue cartridges into the bulkhead around the security panel neutralising any electrics while Platt placed strategic lumps of plastic about the frame of the door.
Wilkes watched as the sapper produced small fuses that worked remotely and inserted them into the lumps of grey matter. They all took a good ten paces back either side of the door and pressed up against the wall.
When it blew, the metal door buckled inwards giving sufficient room for a grown man to walk through without touching the edges that were jagged and hot.
Jumbo, the most heavily armoured went first. He caught the sentry inside even as the man was drawing a bead on him from behind a screened position. The man was down with a bullet in his head even as the guard’s first shot flew past Jumbo ricocheting harmlessly off the opposite wall.
The others moved in behind him and spread out to cover the whole room. The bridge crew remained calm and remained at their stations, the Captain faced the door expectantly. He looked grim recognising the futility of retaliation and offered no resistance to the intruders.
Wilkes looked around him. There was a resumed countdown in progress and everyone seemed glued to the screens and the central holo-projection as it continued verbally from its last position.
An AI voice was talking the countdown, “3 - 2 - 1 Phase 1 completed.”
Scott looked at the hologram, there was a massive globe shaped apparition within the holo-field that had vague similarities to the view of the town as they arrived. He recognised it.
“Oh Crap! That’s us, Wilkes. We’ve just gone fully shielded,” he cried out in surprise.
Wilkes turned to him confused while Jumbo advanced on the Captain. “Turn that friggin thing off.. NOW!” he commanded threateningly at the man, who stood his ground bravely against the massive frame of the angry mercenary.
“No can do, I’m afraid. The system is automated and is no longer responding to our commands,” the Captain replied.
Jumbo raised his gun to hit the Captain with it’s butt, when the AI’s voice came through loud and clear on the speakers and stopped him.
“BEGIN PHASE 2 in thirty seconds.” It then began counting down.
XeraC’s voice interrupted the mercenaries as he finally came back on-line. He had managed to enter the CCC to witness the final countdown by the AI controlling the activity. It was Sedal, he recognised the AI’s voice.
“What’s going on? You were supposed to take over this centre and stop this,” his voice reverberated through their earpieces so loud that Platt had to pinch the back of his ear to control the pain.
Wilkes for his part stood easy. The others taking their stance from him were at ease and stood down while he looked around the room at what was occurring.
“It would seem to me, XeraC, that the AI’s in charge here. These people are doing nothing except watching their screens. Nobody here is doing a damned thing,” he stated into his comms while astutely observing the worried look on everyone’s face, none of which was in response to his men and their explosive arrival.
The Officer called Dumfries turned to Wilkes and motioned him over. “You might want to read this?”
Wilkes and Scott moved over together covering the officer, while Platt and Jumbo kept guns trained on the crew that were still offering no resistance.
Wilkes read the screen that Dumfries indicated and smiled. Patting his comms to activate voice he called XeraC.
“XeraC, you might want to take a look at this screen message. I believe it’s intended for you.”
The response was quick. “I see it,” then across the whole of the ARK XeraC’s voice screamed out through the public speakers.
“DAMN YOU TO HELL, OSBOURNE!”
Scott took a look at the screen which was angled so that the view was restricted unless you looked at it from the right perspective. The screen was empty except for two lines of text, white on black.
It displayed a simple message.
XeraC, You win this round. These are now your people - so treat them well.
By the way, I gave Sedal the control codes. Osbourne.”
ARK 1 - Lift-Off
Mike Patterson was nervous, but he was too professional to show it in front of his team. They needed to be calm for what was to come. The news had said that enemy ships were entering Earth space and there was nothing much in the way to stop them.
He had seen the bulletins issued by Space Council, warning people to be prepared for the worst. They anticipated a laser bombardment from space followed by an invasion of shuttles with metallic warriors. The military had zero experience in such warfare, so were doing their usual ‘all options’ scenario and bringing out everything in preparation for the assault on the planet.
Mike knew the Space Navy could never hope to stem the massive tide of ships. His mind wandered briefly as he thought of his son, Jimmi, flying in those new Reaver-class ships of theirs. His AI co-pilot, a recent innovation, had been very concerned that Jimmi and Mike had an opportunity to get together and so had orchestrated an excuse for Mike to be at Orient Station while his son was there for a briefing on their new space craft. There had been too few opportunities to say a proper goodbye and now, it would be impossible to talk to him - he would already be in the midst of the of the fighting.
Regardless, the highly secret aspect of the ARK project wouldn’t allow them to meet again. Jimmi had chosen his path instead of joining his father on the ARK, preferring instead to defend their home. Mike, as a father, would miss him deeply.
The governments had been working like crazy to set up out-of-city zones where civilian people could flee. Mostly, these were in the hills and mountain regions where they could be protected, shielded from detection.
Nobody really knew if the Nubl were robots, or sentient beings. To Mike, it didn’t seem to amount to much of a difference. Invaders were invaders - they weren’t ever going to be good news, whichev
er they turned out to be.
He had been party to one of the early SC briefings and knew more than most. As he understood it, these Nubl had no interest in preserving the human population, instead were set to annihilate everyone, or as the SC put it - anything biological would be eradicated. That wasn’t on the news though, why scare people to death when they would be dead soon enough either way.
His cousin had called from Space Island and given him the low-down on the scale of the threat. After that it was a matter of putting plans into effect from the early days of the Fortress.
When mad General Ferris had sat in the meeting and told his scientists to “build me a fortress that can float in the sky,” they had chuckled, but he made them lay out the plans for a working design which later sparked the idea for a Sky City Project. Those plans eventually evolved into this one. Now they were finished and ready to go.
All of the ARK’s townspeople had arrived and the Tower was ready to begin the final countdown. There had been a check count of everyone, the animals too. The food stores had been optimised, at least that’s what the quartermasters and nutritionists called it. It probably meant there would be rationing from day one. Mike put it out of his head, food was the least of their problems at the moment.
He looked around him, his 360 degree view allowed him the opportunity of surveying the town from corner to corner. The pillars at all sixteen edges were almost as high as his, yet here, in the centre, he was fifty meters above the habitats below and fully two kilometres from each pillar.
The buildings were all square or rectangular and could be cranked underground by the engineers in a matter of minutes. They were designed to operate as a series of levels with adjoining corridors underground where they would join the rest of the network that made up ARK City which in places extended over a kilometre below him.
It was impossible to see past the extent of the town’s borders because the land had been deliberately built up. Bushes, trees and fences had been placed strategically to provide an impenetrable barrier. They would have built walls like in the old days of castles and moats, but the local planning offices had a fit when they tried that. Instead, the shield technology had been modified and now provided a forcefield between the pillars. Nothing would get through that – in, or out.
The district council had baulked at the imposition of the ARK project on their territory. They had little concept of its intended use. They had been informed it was just a gated community that had been displaced and re-homed. Some attempts were made by the Mayor to take control of the town, even to the extent of demanding a census of the inhabitants so they could impose taxes. Space Island had thrown out their police and the SCN had regularly patrolled the perimeter thereafter. There was no further trouble.
“Mike, are we ready to activate phase 1?” Shroeder asked from behind him.
Turning to speak to his second-in-command, he could see the thin man was grey with worry. Johann had heard the news as well and feared for their survival despite the plans they had put together these last few years. He was an old and dear friend and Mike had, on several occasions, had to help him cope with his fear for the survival of humanity. He was one of those people who, despite their own best efforts, always looked to the negative. Mike balanced his temperament perfectly and between them they forged a safe path for the ARK project.
“Yes, Johann. Advise all pillar technicians to monitor output and report any anomalies. We will proceed now,” Mike confirmed.
“Mr Belling, advise all ARKs, lift-off to proceed on my mark,” he called to the comms tech, giving him time to pass the necessary instructions out to the others. All twenty ARKs would proceed to lift-off simultaneously and would synchronise their actions to optimise the secrecy of their mission.
He pointed at Belling to confirm the verbal instruction he was about to give... “MARK!”
The automated count began immediately... 10... .9..... 8...
He turned around to look back into the central control tower that he manned. All twenty two technicians knew exactly what to do. A large flat monitor was suspended at either end of the room and between it, there was a 3D hologram of the town and the sixteen pillars positioned at equidistant points.
5.... 4.... 3....
As he watched the 3D version of the pillars began to change colour, from the base up. First turning red as they warmed, then yellow as they began to activate, and finally, a full ten seconds into the count, they became a solid green.
“Activating now!” A voice came from the pit, the reinforced area where all the operational controls were housed, confirming shield defences were online.
As Mike continued to watch the virtual rendition of the sixteen pillars, the wall of the forcefield turned from clear to grey as nanobots moved into position, providing an additional armoury against anything that might attempt to penetrate. The main reason they were there though, was to monitor the shield, providing a visible reminder to people that the field was active, not that they could get through it or come to harm.
Mike turned back to the long curved window and looked out across the fields, using his binoculars for a closer look. The grey walls had risen to their correct position of 25% up the pillar height. It was enough, a ten metre barrier.
“Begin phase 2,” he called to Johann who was now on the other side of the tower checking the pillars visually from his half.
“A count of 10, on my mark,” Schroeder called into the pit and a flurry of activity erupted as everyone set about their own list of tasks. It was a crucial moment and there was no turning back, this had to work first time, or they would be at the mercy of whatever was coming their way.
Nobody watched the countdown clock. It was a precision operation and they could hear it ticking mechanically as they pressed switches, clicked keyboards and turned dials. It was eery to watch the hologram creating a coloured ambience over their heads as it began to change.
Mike observed the hologram as the clear area around the green pillars changed to a multi-dotted globe surrounding the whole area, forming a large semi-transparent ball that isolated them from everything outside the town. Looking back out the window, nothing had changed, it was just a visual representation of the shield that was now in operation.
The old shields used to shimmer with unrestrained forces, but the refinements in subsequent designs by the Fortress teams had eliminated all inefficiencies in the shield’s operations. They were now totally invisible that even birds could fly into them without realising it was there.
The designers had built a soft zone into the shields that provided a three hundred centimetre buffer, just enough to bring a bird to a stop and allow them to fly off again, unharmed.
“Messages coming in from ARK2 through to ARK20 confirming successful phase 1 and 2, sir,” the comms tech called to Mike.
“Acknowledged, Mr Belling.”
“Confirm ARK1 ready for final phase. Phase 3, countdown in ten seconds. Mark.” He noted the confirming nod from the tech involved in putting the town through its final countdown..
“Aye sir, confirming countdown - Phase 3 - Now in progress.”
8.... 7..... 6..... 5....
Mike didn’t look at the pit. Turning back outward, he watched for signs of a successful separation. He knew he couldn’t line up on anything in the foreground, so looked instead at the distant hills he had spent months climbing, to survey the best location to build this town. As he watched, he saw beams of light coming from outer space. The Nubl had arrived, his world was under attack. He had minutes now to ensure his people were safe.
“Activating anti-gravity motors... Now!” the Helmsman confirmed.
“Phase 3 activated, final separation in three seconds.”
3.... 2.... 1..... Active.
“Helm responding, sir. Lift off in progress.”
Mike watched the hill tops disappear as they sunk beneath the side of the forcefields. He glanced at the hologram which would give him a tactical layout. It showed they were already one h
undred metres and rising. The globe that was now ARK1 had achieved lift-off and was now airborne.
“Belling, advise condition of all ARKs,” he called out.
There was a pause.
“Sir, getting confirmations from all ARKs except 4 and 16.”
“Keep monitoring those two, Belling. I need to know what the problem is,” Mike ordered.
There were over ten thousand people in each of the ARK’s, they couldn’t afford to lose any of them. He walked the gangway that was his domain, circuiting the tower. Schroeder was equally concerned on his side, but was showing it, chewing his thumb nail and walking in short bursts back and forth.
“Johann,” he called, then shook his head as Shroeder looked up. He understood, and stood more upright, placing his hands behind his back. Mike had been working on Johann’s stress indicators for months. Now all it took was a glance to get him to relax.
“16 is active and airborne, sir. They quote comms issues from nearby laser strikes. Apparently, Dallas suffered a direct hit,” Belling called out.
Mike digested that news. Dallas was Alice’s home city. She would be watching the news with her new partner and would know this already, he thought, glad everyone he knew was already out of there and in the hills. It was going to be tough for anyone left there, such as the military units stationed to ensure no looting and providing essential meals and emergency aid to those who couldn’t get out.
“Keep trying ARK4,” Mike prompted him. “Helm, what can you tell me?”
“Three hundred metres, all AG engines optimal, applying thrust now, sir.”
Mike looked back out at the skies and swore. There had to be hundreds of laser strikes coming out of the sky. They looked like meteors, but he knew, even though he couldn’t see yet, that they were all weapon density and directed at their major cities.
“Switch monitor view to peripheral cameras, show Earth view on holodeck,” he ordered.
Everyone watched as laser after laser struck distant shields. He feared the worst for Denver. The beams continuously pulsed out of the skies, adding to others, concentrating in single areas. There were no attacks local to them and Mike was grateful for all of the time he had spent surveying to ensure conditions were perfect for their plans. He hoped all the other ARKs were safe.