by Ben Winston
"Why would you need to take a leave to work on that?" Greg asked.
"Salandria has her hive building the local gate, and it would be good if I could go out there to help," Mani replied. 'Salandria' was actually the Greynus Hive Queen S'l'adri'a who was working with the science departments and fixers to build experimental facilities. "Once she sees what we're going to need in the gate, she can take her hive to Harclen and build the other test gate."
"I was going to ask you how that project was going," Greg asked.
"Slower than Arless' pet project, but then again, mine is slightly bigger," Mandi replied.
Arless snorted and nodded. "That's the plain truth!"
"I don't know," Greg replied. "Those mining ships Alress dreamed up are pretty damn big!"
"That's true sir, but the technology we're using on the mining ships is all known and well established; for me, it's just a matter of basically putting blocks together in a different order. Mandi is also creating the blocks," Arless replied, defending his friend.
Mandi rolled her eyes at Greg. "The slip-gate tests have been going well so far; the hardest issue we've had is keeping the gates aligned for more than a few microseconds. We created an alignment subroutine that, once the gates do align, should keep them that way. Like with any new technology, we have a lot more testing to do."
"Speaking of testing, Abraxis told me how you both believe the Cabal is using anti-matter to power their craft," Greg replied.
Mandi nodded. "That's true, but to be fair, we really don't have enough evidence to prove anything conclusively. Both Arless and I can easily see the Cabal doing this to its own people, especially since those same people don't really have a choice in the matter."
Greg nodded. "While I tend to agree with you in principle, we need to try to remain as objective as we can in our official reports. You two are our resident experts on technology; we need you to try to keep your personal feelings out of it as much as you can."
Jarad watched as the scene played out at the entrance to their building. One of the Cabal drones had ventured into the area looking for the rebels. Of course, it was in the middle of the rebel camp but hadn't detected anything until now.
The young man groaned as he tried to crawl back from the door and away from the drone. "Go away! I ain't got nothing to do with nothing!"
"If that is true citizen, then explain your wounds?" a voice from the drone replied.
"I woz on my way back home from my shift when all hell broke loose over at yer main buildin'. 'Fore I could get outta there, I get tagged by a stray bullet," the man replied. "I crawled in here and tried to wait it out before heading for home."
"State your name and shift number, Citizen," the drone ordered.
"Labrowski, Leon. The third shift; northwest reclamation crew," the man replied easily.
"Labrowski, Leon, You wounds are not consistent with your story of events. You have been wounded by laser fire from Imperial weapons; that means you are a rebel and are under arrest. You will surrender your weapons and remain in place until a squad arrives to take you into…" The man removed the modified tazer from the main gyroscope while the drone dropped to the floor,
"Do I look armed, you bucket of bolts?" the man, 'Leon' replied.
"The Drones, when they're on their own like that one was, have a very slow response time. There are also enough exposed electrical conduits and live power lines that they can knock themselves out from time to time. It pretty much scrambles their memory, so when they finish rebooting, they return to base for maintenance. The drone locations are tracked, so we have to be careful about how many we take down like this, as well as where we do it," Randy replied.
"Any idea where they're monitored from?" Jarad asked.
Randy shook his head. "Not really, we thought it might have been the headquarters building we destroyed last night, but if these bastards are still out in force, then it couldn't have been it." Randy shook his head. "It has to be a place closer to the airport!"
"Prob'ly, ol'man, but that would be a one-way trip there. They got tanks and shit up there we just can't mess wit!" the big man paused. "You tell him 'bout the kids yet?"
"No, I hadn't gotten that far yet," Randy said sadly. "For some reason, we haven't figured out yet, the Cabal will go to extremes to capture kids. The ones they don't take to the casinos get taken out of the city, but we don't know where. We do know it isn't the base; they transport them differently that they do captured people. They load them up on buses; we think they're taking them to Reno."
Jarad looked confused. "I wonder what they want with the children? I'll be sure to let command know about it, maybe we can figure it out and do something about it."
At the entrance of the building, several men picked up the drone and carried it out of the building. "Once you start using the new weapons and armor, it won't take the Cabal long to figure out you got help. They'll start looking for this place."
Randy nodded. "Considering our location, they should find it quickly enough. I'm actually surprised they haven't found us already."
"Some of the stuff we're leaving you will need a truck to be moved," Jarad replied. "We had planned on just leaving it here, protected by shields and holograms. I don't think that's gonna work. We need to make you folks more portable."
Randy shook his head. "The fighters, maybe, but we have a lot of civilians we're protecting and they can't be moved as easily."
"How many are you protecting?" Jarad asked.
"Almost a thousand now, we save more every day," Randy replied.
"Fuckin' zombies capture more'n we can get to. Wit' the' new stuff you brought us, we'll be changin' that real soon, though," Z-Lay replied, grinning evilly.
"Have any of those you rescued been from Cabal hands?" Jarad asked.
Randy nodded. "Yeah, and I know what you're thinking. We have some spies in the group. We've been keeping the questionable folks in a different area, about ten or so blocks south of here. It's hard to move about since vehicles or larger groups of people tend to draw the Cabal's attention. We do use dirt bikes and a couple of ATVs for recon and sometimes for fast transport, but we can only carry one person other than the driver on each of the bikes. The ATVs can carry more, but they still get the attention of the hunter drones."
"It sounds like you have more issues with the drones than you do with the troopers themselves," Jarad said.
"Their doctrine seems to be to let the drones hunt for people while the troops stay in their bases. Once the drones locate something, then they add more drones as well as troops for the strike. Since the drones have been impossible for us to even scratch, it's been working for them so far," Randy explained.
Jarad chuckled, "Well, at least that part of their operation will be changing quickly." He looked thoughtful for a moment. "What about underground?"
"Underground what?" a young Latino man asked as he walked up. He was escorting a pretty African-American girl that had her eyes covered; Z-lay's sister. "I may be Latino, Homes, but I ain't no good with no shovel!"
"Ranger Fighter Jarad, this is Carlos Salizar. In addition to being one sneaky fighter, he also has an instinctual grasp of intel analysis. The young lady beside him is Z-Lay's sister, Chissandra. Before she was blinded by laser fire from the cabal, she was our best mechanic," Randy replied.
"I was two months from my engineering degree at UNLV when these bastards moved in," the girl replied. "A near miss while trying to steal a truck full of supplies and I haven't been able to see anything since."
"That had to really suck, at least you got out of there," Jarad replied. "We brought a doctor and some advanced medical facilities with us, you should let her check you out and see if we can't fix you up."
"I would very much appreciate that, Ranger," the girl replied.
"Uh, you're not allergic to cats are you?" Jarad asked as he led Carlos and the girl toward the doctor.
"So that's how the rebels down here are doing and how they've managed to survive this long
," Jarad said finishing his report.
"They are a tenacious bunch, I'll give them that. They do understand that at the present time, there is no way we can retake the city, right?" Greg asked.
"Yeah, they know the place is lost, they have been focusing on trying to rescue people and get them away from the Cabal. The problem is, that they haven't had the weapons to really do much, and they don't have a place to put the people. If they get very much larger, they won't be able to hide from the Cabal sensors down here. I was hoping we could get a drone down here to build an underground base for them, and possibly build a tunnel out of the city to a place we can pick up the folks they rescue," Jarad replied. "There is also the question of where are they taking the kids and what are they doing with them?"
"We know they are up to something, we just haven't been able to figure out what. I just wish we had the troops to go in there and shut them down before they do too much more damage." Greg sighed. "We do know they're making a slow push into California, from the Reno area. Our troops are fighting them, but we are slowly losing ground. We just don't have enough trained people to stop them," Greg replied. We're trying to get the people relocated, out of the way, but most of them don't want to leave, even after the fighting starts. The folks that survive get taken away; we don't know where yet."
"Well, that's not completely true, Commander," Lionel replied. "Most of them are being trained as troops for the Cabal, They are being taken some place and indoctrinated like the pilots and other soldiers were, then given a little training, armed and armored, and sent back out. We don't know how long the process takes, but it can't be that long since they seem to be growing faster than we are."
"Do you have an estimate on force size yet Lionel?" Jarad asked.
"Not yet, Sir," Lionel replied. "But we do know they have at least three divisions of ground troops and are building up a lot of air forces. The planes they are building appear to be anti-matter powered, which means they are basically flying nuclear bombs. They are also not atmospheric; which means they will be able to leave the planet and fight in space as well. In all honesty, they could attack us up here at any time."
Jarad nodded. "I was afraid of that. Greg, I recommend an increase in defenses up there. If we don't make sure everything we are doing up there is protected, they are going to hit us when we least expect it, and they could hurt us badly. Shields have to be in place as soon possible from now on. I would install as many weapons as we can as well, but I suppose that can be done during construction. Has there been any word on the orbital fortress being design by Ned and his group?"
Greg nodded. "The design is finished, and three of them are being built in part of the military shipyard. The crews are also in the process of being trained. I believe the first one should be launched in about two more weeks. This is turning into a race we can't afford to lose."
"Lionel, did we get a feel for how many people are joining the Cabal freely?" Jarad asked.
Lionel shrugged. "For now, it's about a thousand a week or so, it would probably be more if folks from other countries could get there. It's far from a majority, the skinhead group you mentioned is not typical; the KKK and other such groups seem to be flocking to join up, even though the Cabal is clearly multi-racial."
"Jarad getting back to the group you're with; in order to build a base for those guys, you'd need a construction drone. The smaller ones can't really work fast enough, and aren't really equipped for something like that anyway," Greg replied. "The problems are that with that many sensors in the area, the drone would be detected, even if we could get one to you."
"What about a small pod of Greynus?" Joyce asked.
Greg looked thoughtful but shook his head. "Again, we couldn't get them there and even if we could, we couldn't feed them and recovery would be an issue."
Jarad nodded agreement. "The folks down here seem to have accepted the Doctor readily enough, but I don't think they are ready for giant insects yet."
Carl grinned. "Hang on a sec… I have an idea," he turned slightly and made a call. "Amos, aren't you from the Las Vegas Area?"
"Yes I am, why do you ask?" Master Amos Greeley, the Master Miner asked.
"We're trying to figure out how to help the rebels in Vegas protect themselves from the Cabal forces in the area. An underground base would be best, but we have no way of getting a drone in there," Carl asked.
"Hmm, hang on a second," the man said and typed on his own terminal. "A few years ago, there was a plan to build either a subway or some other kind of mass transit system there. The problem they had was the price tag. Still, there were a few of the casinos that got together and started a project that was supposed to be an expansion of the existing monorail system, only most of it was going to be underground.
"Ah, here it is. They actually made a lot of progress in getting the tunnels dug, but ran out of money before they could finish them. Presently, there is a large tunnel that runs most of the length of the strip. There was supposed to be a major terminal at McCarran International, with the other end in Northern Las Vegas near a bunch of museums. If we could tie into that, it would give them a whole bunch of options," Amos finished.
"Hey Amos, It's Jarad Danielson. The problem with that is the strip is also the heaviest concentration of Cabal forces in the city. Both McCarran as well as Nellis Air Force Base or very heavily defended and have the largest concentration of enemy forces. Still, we would also have the problem of getting something down here to do the digging."
"Aye, but that's the beauty of this Ranger; you won't need to do much diggin' at all. None of the terminals were finished. While the tunnels are close to the casino's none of them got connected. However, the company doing the work still had to be able to get in there. Since no one wanted any of that close to the strip and thus disturbing the gambling, access is in an industrial area five blocks west of the strip off of Flamingo Road," Amos explained.
"We're not all that far away from there right now; I wonder why none of the local folks know about it?" Jarad asked.
"I'm sure they do, it wasn't all that secret of a project. Maybe there's another reason they never mentioned it," Amos replied. "But, as I said, the tunnels didn't get finished. I would imagine you'll be lookin' at rough tunnels in most of the places. You'll still need drones in there to do the finish work and make them at least somewhat livable."
"I'll make sure we get it checked out; thanks, Amos!" Jarad replied.
"Any time, Ranger," Amos said and ended the call.
After talking to command, Jarad checked on Randy. Sheness was keeping him unconscious a bit longer in order to get the man a healthy as she could. She had been right to insist on him getting treated immediately, the infection was really bad. She was confident she could cure that and help him even more, but it was going to take longer than she had originally thought.
She did tell him that it would be possible to regrow his leg and repair the other leg back to full use, but it would take time in the hospital on the moon. Time he couldn't afford right now.
As for Z-Lay's sister, she had burnt retinas. Again, it was fully repairable, but it would take a few days in the hospital. Chissandra, Carlos, and Z-Lay had been discussing the girl's return with Jarad to get the treatment and also for some training in engineering.
Jarad had also learned that Randy had been training Z-Lay and Pro-V, the other major gang leader, in guerrilla warfare tactics. Carlos had been getting trained as well but was getting more of an intelligence angle. After seeing more of what was going on down here, Jarad agreed with the man's decision. No matter what happened, life would never return to normal here. The former Gangs and their various activities were gone, a thing of the past now.
Getting a cup of coffee, Jarad headed for Z-Lay, Carlos, Pro-V, and Chissandra sitting at one of the small tables that had gotten set up to feed people on.
"May I join you?" Jarad asked.
"Pull up a rock. What yo peeps say?" Pro-V asked.
"They agree we need to g
et you a safe place to work out of, but can't send down any of our heavier equipment without bringing the zombies down on you. But, one of our folks up there is from here and suggested the tunnels under the strip. Do you guys know anything about them?" Jarad asked.
"Yeah, they's haunted.We sent some folks down there a while ago to check it out, we heard them screaming about twenty minutes later," Carlos said.
Chissandra chuckled. "The local Native Americans had tried to block that project when they started it. They said digging that deep into the earth would upset the gods. The project itself did seem to be cursed with accidents and cave-ins. One of the things that shut it down was all the lawsuits from the injuries and deaths.
"I don't believe in all the mystical crap that has these guys spooked, but there is something down there; we just have no way to find out what it is,"
Jarad grinned. "We do now," he pulled out his tablet and sat it on the table. He touched a few buttons and a hologram took form above it. "I can send a couple drones down there to see what's going on."
He quickly selected a couple of the drones and gave them their orders. "There, it'll take them a couple of minutes to get there and start their survey. Have you guys made a decision about Chissandra going back to the base with us?"
Again the girl spoke. "Yeah, and I'm going. The guys don't like it, but I need to do this. We're going to need someone trained in this tech in order to keep it running, and I want to be able to see again. Besides, I threatened to start calling them by their real names if they didn't agree."
"Amigo, it's a small thing, and I feel bad about asking, but is there a way you can bring us a priest? Many of my posse are catholic and none of us have been to mass or confession in weeks," Carlos asked.
"I can certainly check into it for you. What happened to all the clergy here in Vegas?" Jarad asked.
"The zombies," Z-Lay grumbled. "Street preachers, even the guys from the wedding booths got shot. They really have a hate on for religion. Anyone even remotely religious was shot down and left lying in the street. It was the same with the teachers and professors at the colleges. Some of them they took, but the rest…" He shook his head.