by Isaac Hooke
“You know you want it,” Bender said cruelly. “That Phant’s going to crawl right up your ass.”
“What if Ganye really doesn’t want to be possessed?” Harlequin said. “If so, then this is wrong.”
“We need some sort of host to carry the Phant,” Rade said. “Unless you would like to oblige?”
“No,” Harlequin said.
“Didn’t think so,” Rade replied. “We’ll set the Artificial free after this is done, assuming Ganye is telling the truth about his involvement.”
When the Phant had flowed completely inside, the eyes of Ganye momentarily swam with purple drops before clearing. Purple condensation settled on the back of the Artificial’s neck, and then Ganye looked up: “What do you want?” His voice had changed slightly, becoming deeper, more authoritative.
“We want you,” Surus said. She fired the stun rifle once more.
Ganye collapsed.
Rade half-expected the Phant to bubble to the surface as before, but the condensation on the nape of the Artificial’s neck remained constant—apparently once settled within an AI core, a Phant was not so easily dislodged.
“Sprint?” Surus said.
The Hoplite stepped back. Surus scooped up the Artificial and leaped into the cockpit. The hatch shut behind her.
“I’m ordering Sprint to control the Hoplite, going forward,” Surus said. “As planned, I will continue to stun Ganye until we make it back to the Argonaut. Get us out of here, Rade.”
“Gladly,” Rade said.
twenty-four
Rade noticed the klaxon had shut off by then. Probably not a good thing.
“I don’t suppose we can go back to that blue dimension and float our way out?” Manic said.
“You actually want to go there, bitch?” Bender said. “With those life-sucking worms?”
“Why not?” Manic said. “It’ll be easier.”
“That blue place is like being dead,” Bender said. “While it was a trip, I never want to go back there. And you would want the easy way out. Don’t you remember the sign that hung over the grinder in training? Easy is for sissies.”
“That’s not what it said,” Manic insisted.
“Well, that’s how I remember it.”
“There’s no easy way out, not this time,” Rade said. “I suspect the aliens won’t use the quantum cannon against us anymore. They’ve realized by now it didn’t work all that well. We’re going to have to fight our way out of here.”
Rade glanced at his overhead map. On it, the compartment they were inside appeared as an island amid an unmapped sea of blackness. Towards the outskirts of that dark ocean resided the filled-out launch tubes, conveyor belt platforms, and the passageway the Argonauts had entered before encountering the cannon.
“TJ, how accurate is our location on this map?” Rade asked. “Considering that our systems were offline the whole time we traveled through the passageways and compartments in between.”
“I would say not very accurate at all,” TJ replied. “The gyroscopes and accelerometers would have no proper frame of reference. According to the map, we have to travel southeast to return to the launch tubes. In actuality, we may have to travel northwest.”
“Probably a labyrinth out there,” Bender said. “Like traveling through a bug’s intestines. Or Manic’s.”
“Believe me,” Manic said. “Traveling through my intestines is a breeze compared to this.”
“So that’s what your boyfriends tell you,” Bender quipped.
“Perhaps I can be of some assistance,” Surus said.
“What, with traveling through Manic’s intestines?” Bender asked.
“A moment,” Surus replied.
“She has to put on some surgical gloves, first,” Bender said.
Rade received a data request. He accepted and the map updated, filling out the route between here and the launch tubes. The launch area was actually northward, not southeast. “Where did you get this?”
“I stunned our Phant, bringing Ganye to the fore once more,” Surus said. “The governor’s sensor systems remained active the whole time the aliens carried him into the ship. He made a map.”
“Nicely done,” Rade said. “Argonauts, we make for those launch tubes!”
Before he finished speaking, the hatch on the far side of the compartment opened. Tahoe, Lui, and TJ were standing guard, and opened fire at the bugs that rushed inside.
Rade and the others joined them, filling up the entrance with spider corpses. There wasn’t enough room for them to teleport inside, apparently. Especially not with those corpses.
Some of the bodies were dragged from the entrance, obviously by those bugs waiting behind them. Then more came forward, turrets blazing away.
Rade kept behind his shield and returned fire.
“Overlap shields, Argonauts!” Rade said. “We’re going to have to force our way outside!”
They formed a phalanx three abreast and three deep. Those in the front had their shields pointed forward. Those in the middle held them overhead, and those on drag held the shields behind them.
The group shoved their way through any dead and into the T intersection beyond. Rade chose the right-hand branch, which, according to the map, would eventually take them to the launch area.
The passageway fit three Hoplites abreast, and they were able to maintain their formation. They fired in both directions, against the bugs that assailed from both sides.
Some of the enemy abdomens tilted upward, trying to aim their turrets over the shields, but the aliens simply struck the upturned shields of those residing in the middle of the squad.
The enemy ranks stopped rushing the Hoplites on both flanks, and began backing away instead, though continuing to fire their turrets. Perhaps they intended to wear down the shields and armor of the squad. A war of attrition.
The Argonauts stepped over the bodies of those they had downed, and sometimes ducked behind those alien corpses, using them as shields to spare their own armor. In fact, Tahoe in the front and Bender on the rear actually grabbed the bodies of fallen spiders and utilized them as extensions of their own shields.
“Hey bugs!” Bender said. “That’s right, you’re going to have to shoot through your bug brothers to get me! Bitches!”
A spider broke from the front ranks, dodged between the dead, and leaped at the group. Lui managed to shoot it with his cobra, but it landed in the vertical gap between the overhead and the shields Rade and the others residing in the middle held above them. Rade felt the weight immediately, and he and the others had to struggle to shrug it off, partially breaking formation in the process. They quickly reformed and continued.
Those who still had grenades used them, sending gory masses of long legs and split thoraxes flying into the air. Eventually the explosions ceased as the Hoplites exhausted the last of their grenades.
The spiders assailing them from up ahead began to vanish. Rade saw a green pool of liquid flowing across the deck before them. Surus was out there helping out; she had left her host, Emilia Bounty, in charge of the captured Phant.
“Our shield integrity back here is getting low,” Manic said from the rear flank.
“Swap out with us,” Rade said.
He, Ms. Bounty and Shaw exchanged positions with Manic, Bender and Harlequin to cover the rear.
Rade scooped up a dead bug underfoot and draped it over his shield. It wasn’t much protection against those enemy laser turrets, but it helped reduced the intensity a little.
The speed of their advance increased with Surus helping out in front.
However, some of the jumper varieties showed up, and began to teleport past Surus in groups to assault the party. Tahoe, Lui and TJ readily shot them down, covering the floor in bodies and preventing further teleporters from appearing.
The attack from the fore let up entirely, and Rade soon understood why: they had reached a breach seal.
Lui opened up his cockpit while the others defended the rear flank, a
nd he climbed down in his jumpsuit to the storage compartment in the leg of the mech. They hadn’t prepared any of the charges for manipulation by the big hands of the mechs—that would have required taping the individual bricks together into larger shapes—so Lui had to grab the charges and place them on the breach seal personally.
When Lui was finished, he returned to the cockpit.
“Let’s give the breach some room!” Rade said.
The party retreated toward the bugs on their rear, and when Rade judged the distant sufficient, he ordered: “Blow it!”
The charges detonated. Rade felt the shockwave even from his position on the rear, and the Hoplites in the center of the formation pressed against his.
“It’s open,” Lui said. “Got a ton of tangos waiting on the other side, though.”
Rade glanced at the overhead map and saw the red dots that had appeared in the forward area.
The party proceeded forward once more, with Surus leading the way. Rade occasionally draped new dead bodies over his shield as he came upon them, courtesy of those aliens the Hoplites on point had felled.
The two mechs on either side of him followed his example, but Surus sometimes touched even the dead, disintegrating them, so there were occasions when there were no fresh bodies to pick up, and all three on the rear had to rely upon their bare shields. Those were the times when Rade’s shield and armor integrity suffered the most.
The Argonauts penetrated three more breach seals, and after what seemed an eternity—though in actuality couldn’t have been more than thirty minutes—they arrived at the launch area. The quantum cannon hadn’t made an appearance during that time: the aliens had indeed abandoned its use.
Keeping formation, Rade and the others piled into the platform next to the conveyor belt, then hurried into the tunnel where the damaged pods resided.
Rade exited his cockpit to affix his own explosives to the hatch in the overhead, and then returned to his mech. The Hoplites retreated to the platform area and defended against the spiders that continued to harry them from the rear. Rade’s shield integrity was down to twenty percent by then, with several holes drilled into the edges.
Surus seeped back into Sprint and in moments vanished inside the mech.
“Surus, you back with us?” Rade asked.
“I’m here,” Surus replied. “Ms. Bounty did a good job of keeping our prisoner stunned. I will continue doing so until we return.”
“Good. Prepare for detonation people.” Rade detonated the charges and felt the shockwave vibrate the hull of his mech.
“We’re through!” Lui said.
Rade hadn’t been sure if the airlock’s outer hatch would be open or not, but judging from the lack of explosive decompression, it was sealed.
“TJ, get inside the airlock and set the charges on the external facing hatch,” Rade said.
Rade continued to defend. A spider teleported onto the platform, appearing in one of the few clear areas. It had been a while since Rade had seen a jumper...
“Charges are in place!” TJ said.
“Wait,” Rade said. “Cover me.”
He leaped onto the platform, holding his shield toward the aliens, and grabbed the body of the dead jumper. He dragged it across the floor, retreating to his Argonauts.
“I want Surus to figure out how these things teleport, if she can,” Rade said. “When we get back to the ship.” He glanced at TJ’s mech. “Blow the final charge.”
The detonation came. Rade felt the resultant gush of air sweeping past: the Hoplites were too heavy to be drawn outside by the force of explosive decompression alone, and the living spiders ahead simply clasped onto the hollows on the deck and bulkhead to brace themselves. The dense bodies of the dead spiders were slowly dragged along the platform toward the tunnel.
“Fire jumpjets!” Rade said. “Let’s get out of here!”
Rade jetted backward into the outflow and sped into the breached hatches of the airlock, and the launch tube beyond. He passed between the successive, ring-like protrusions, whose repellant forces kept him centered in the middle of the tube. There was no artificial gravity, so he shut off his jumpjets, allowing the escaping atmosphere to carry him along. He held the dead bug close to his torso, keeping it braced between his shield and hull.
He emerged from the launch tube. The alien ship receded in front of him, the launch tube and those near it soon becoming small spindles. His Argonauts were around him.
The mercenary warships appeared to be making a concerted push at that moment, further driving the enemy vessel away, or at least that was the impression Rade had as the human craft flew past and fresh explosions lit up the hull of the invaders.
Dark streaks emerged from some of the distant spindles, Rade noticed. He zoomed in and saw troop pods. According to the tactical display that replaced the overhead map, those things moved on an intercept course with the team.
“The Argonaut is coming up,” Lui said.
“Already?” Rade glanced at the Argonaut’s location. The vessel was indeed nearby: about five minutes away. “Tap me in.”
“Done,” Lui said.
“Bax, sit-rep?” Rade said.
“Hi, boss,” Fret replied. “Captain Fret here. I took control of the ship once I got back aboard. It seemed like a good idea to bring the Argonaut closer, in case you needed to make a quick getaway.”
“We’re coming in hot,” Rade said. “Fire the vipers at those troop pods!”
“Already gave the order,” Fret said. “I’m also firing a few missiles.”
Some of the pursuing pods changed course as if attempting to avoid the invisible laser assault from the Marauder-class ship. Others appeared to have small bites taken out of their hulls, at least when observed under maximum zoom, and dropped out of the pursuit. Missiles came in next, but most of the pods avoided them easily. One unfortunate pod couldn’t swerve away in time, and when the proximity fuse of the seeker detonated in a bright flash, nothing remained of the pod but debris.
“Lui, are we detecting any incoming lasers from the pursuers?” Rade asked.
“So far, no,” Lui said. “Though I’m sure our individual AIs will alert us if that changes.”
Rade still had Fret on the line. “Fret, what about Batindo and Kato?”
“They’re aboard. I have them staying in Bender’s stateroom.”
“What?” Bender said. “You bitch!”
Technically it wasn’t Bender’s stateroom, as he shared it with TJ, but apparently that point was lost on him.
In five minutes the Hoplites were within visual range of the Argonaut. The ship looked triangular-shaped from the front, what with the way those engine segments protruded downward from the main body.
Rade adjusted his course by firing a burst of lateral thrust and closed with the gray hull.
The Argonaut fired its own lateral thrusters to pivot sideways, facing its hangar bay toward the group; the bay doors were in the process of opening.
“Electron, take us in,” Rade said.
Electron took control of the Hoplite and occasionally fired different thrusters, making minor course adjustments to ensure the mech was properly lined up. The Argonaut grew rapidly in the final few seconds; Rade blinked, and the Hoplite was already inside.
Electron fired aerospike thrusters at the last moment to halt the forward motion, and the Hoplite dropped like a rock in the artificial gravity. Rade landed face first in his mech, right on top of the dead spider he had been carrying.
“Uh,” Rade said. “That was a terrible landing, El.”
“Sorry,” Electron said.
Rade clambered to his feet in the Hoplite as the others dropped around him. He tossed the alien body into one corner and then spun toward the opening. The hangar doors were already closing, and in seconds blotted out the stars.
“What’s the status on the pursuers?” Rade transmitted.
“Thirty of the pods got through,” Fret sent.
“Thirty!” Rade pulle
d up the external camera. He saw the pods in question; they were decelerating to make a flyby. Spiders emerged from open panels near the noses and pushed off in turn. Red mist jetted from the tanks on the backs of the individual spiders—they were venting their portable atmospheres for propulsive purposes, heading straight for the hull of the Argonaut.
“Evasive action!” Rade ordered.
twenty-five
It was too late. The spiders landed on the hull in droves, and soon the surface swam with the things. The aliens were probing, searching for weak spots. Rade cycled through the external cameras. Many of the bugs congregated around airlocks. Others, the hangar bays.
Rade switched to the external camera monitoring the current bay doors. The bugs there seemed to be firing their turrets into the entrance at point-blank range. So far they had seared away the anti-micrometeoroid Whittle layer, and were concentrating on the armor underneath. The aliens hadn’t yet penetrated entirely, but Rade could see the growing bore holes. It wouldn’t take the bugs all that long to burn through.
“Shit, it’s going to cost twenty thousand digicoins to repair those doors!” Rade said. “Open them up!”
The bay doors slid open, pulling the spiders aside with them. There was no explosive decompression, as Rade hadn’t given the order to pressurize the hangar yet.
Rade aimed his cobra at the edges, and when the spiders lurking there aimed their turrets inside, he took them out.
A bug teleported inside, appearing in the open space directly in front of the party.
“Bitch!” Bender said, firing at it with both cobras and following up by stabbing the weapon muzzles into its torso; he thrust both hands apart, ripping the bug in half. Then he deployed the shield in his left arm and brought the flat edge down hard on the head, separating it from the body. “You want to infest my ship? Come on you bitches. Come on!”
Spiders began to swarm inside, obliging him.
Rade and the others shot them down as fast as they could, keeping their shields deployed to protect against the incoming fire.