Marten scanned the space marines behind him. Every time he looked through a visor, he saw men battling fear. Nadia’s eyes were wide with fright, but she managed a tremulous smile. Every armor suit had old scars from former fights. They could have used new gyroc rifles. The plasma cannons had pitted nozzles, showing extended use.
Marten bared his teeth as fierce pride beat in his chest. These were his space marines, the survivors of too many fights. Not all the spit and piss had been knocked out of them yet.
“I’m going to try to ram through the biggest breach,” Osadar said. “None of us could withstand the Sun’s rays for more than several seconds if they caught us outside. We have to get inside behind the station’s insulation.”
“Is the hole big enough?” Marten asked.
A shudder ran through the William Tell. Then another followed the first.
“I’ve detached the troop pods,” Osadar said.
“Is the breach big enough?” Marten asked.
“Not completely,” Osadar said. “You must be ready for a hard impact.”
“Great.”
“Do you desire to space-walk to the station?”
Marten muttered to himself. Suicide by sunshine, he wanted no part of that. “Are you holding up okay?”
“I’ll join you once we’ve docked,” she said. “Does that suit you?”
“Keep talking,” Marten said.
“The cyborgs took my body from me,” Osadar said. “They tore me out of my flesh and turned me into this. We cannot let them win.”
Marten turned to his space marines. “We’re going in,” he said, using an open channel. “This is the fight and we’re the last grunts left. We have to dig out the cyborgs.” Marten swallowed a lump that rose in his chest. “This is going to be nasty, but we’ve beaten these freaks before. They want to enslave us. They want to bury implants in our brains. There’s only one answer to that, a bullet in their head. Nothing matters today but winning. We’re all expendable if just one of us is left standing at the end to use the Sunbeam as a free man.”
“Kill the cyborgs!” Group-Leader Xenophon shouted.
“They killed Jupiter,” Marten said. “They hunted down every human in the system. We can do the same to them if we win.”
“Can we win?” a space marine asked.
Marten laughed harshly. “I’ve got a gun in my hand and bastards telling me I’m going to be his slave. Live or die, I’m going to fight and show them they’re facing men!”
The Jovians roared bloodthirsty oaths as they shook their weapons.
“Now grab onto something,” Marten said. “This is going to get rough.”
* * *
In the sealed pilot’s chamber, Osadar sat alone in her combat armor. Heavy shields were locked before the ballistic glass window.
With her gauntleted fingers, she tapped the screen. The ion engine burned hotter as it increased thrust. Using sensors and outer cameras, she saw the exhaust licking against the Sun Station. The heavily-hulled circular structure was over half a kilometer in diameter.
The universe owes me for all the injustice it has heaped upon me. Just once, I would like some good luck.
Her screen showed motion on the station. With a sinking feeling, she realized she shouldn’t have through directly against fate. The universe had heard and now it screwed her yet again.
Osadar bared her teeth. It must have been an unconscious gesture learned from Kluge. The man never quit. He kept charging against insane odds in his quixotic quest for freedom. He was a fool, but Marten Kluge was her fool and friend. Maybe he was the universe’s prank against those who thought they could control everything.
Using a close-up, Osadar zeroed in on the biggest breach, the one she aimed for. Those were suited cyborgs. They tracked the patrol boat. With a tap, she zoomed an even closer shot. The cyborgs held silvery, hand-held missiles. As the cameras watched, the cyborgs fired. Silvery missiles streaked for the boat.
Osadar laughed. It was a strange sound. Each silvery sliver melted in the boat’s ion exhaust. One after another, they turned into slag and then disappeared.
It was then Osadar spotted wrecked auto defenses on the outer station hull. That explained much. The cyborgs must have destroyed them going in.
We didn’t give them time to fix them.
Osadar tensed her muscles. In seeming slow motion, the William Tell backed into the Sun Station, the ion exhaust licking against the outer hull.
“No,” Osadar whispered.
At another breach more cyborgs appeared. They launched a flock of hand-held missiles. As Osadar fired a PD cannon at the cyborgs, the missiles slammed into the boat. Explosions rocked the craft as warheads blew away sections of boat. Polymers, foam, and air sprayed outward.
Osadar slapped a switch. Then she cinched her straps. Seconds later, the Jovian vessel crumpled against the Sun Station, a portion making it through as the rest shredded in a groan and then a terrible shriek of metal.
It is your time, Marten Kluge. Screw the cyborgs if you can.
* * *
It was chaos aboard the William Tell. Marines slammed against each other. Sections of ship tore apart. In his headphones, Marten heard yelling. Then he realized he shouted as loud as he could. As he flew across the chamber, grunting, as he sank against hardened foam, Marten had time to believe that this was worse than the sled-ride onto the Bangladesh’s particle-shields. He flew a different way and clanged against another marine. His head banged around in his helmet, fortunately cushioned by pads for this express reason. Terrible screeching assaulted his ears. Then it was over. He lay still, a mass of bruises and sore joints. It hurt to shift. Jovians were piled on and around him.
Knowing they had little time, Marten clenched his teeth and forced himself to move his arm. He would not groan. He would not give in to pain. He had to act now.
He tapped a forearm pad. A groan did slide from his tightened lips as a needle jabbed his flesh. It injected a double dose of painkillers. He took a deep breath and managed to say, “Get up. Let’s get going.”
“My leg is broke,” a space marine radioed.
“No excuses,” Marten said, “not today. Shoot yourself with painkillers. If that doesn’t help, use more. We made it here and now we have a job to do.”
“It’s dark.”
“Use your infrared,” Marten said.
“Mine’s not working,” Xenophon said.
Marten tried his. “Mine isn’t either. It must have something to do with the nearness to the Sun. It doesn’t matter. Use your helmet-lamps. We’re used to that.”
“Lamps aren’t going to help us gain surprise over cyborgs,” Xenophon said.
“If it isn’t one thing, it’s another,” Marten said. “Now no more excuses. Follow me. It’s time to kick cyborg ass.”
In the light of his helmet-lamp, Marten shoved aside wreckage. Behind him, space marines followed as more lamps clicked on. In the wash of thirty beams, the humans worked in tandem.
The storming of the Sun Station began as Marten Kluge eased through a jagged opening. He left the wreckage of the William Tell and entered the first chamber. What he found there told the story.
There were blast holes in the bulkheads and sparking circuitry. A cable writhed back and forth as a thick liquid oozed from it. Worse were floating Highborn, dead soldiers in breached powered armor. One big Highborn was missing his head as blood floated where the neck should have been. Fewer dead cyborgs drifted in their battle-suits, helmets shattered and foreheads shot out. The Highborn had known the rule on how to kill the melds.
“It was a massacre,” Xenophon whispered.
Marten noticed he could hear the Jovian’s voice more clearly. The station blocked more of the Sun’s interference than the William Tell had.
“Keep together,” Marten said. With a practiced shove, he pushed off the floor and floated past the dead. Using his gyroc rifle, he shoved a drifting cyborg out of his way. As he neared the blasted hatch, Marten’s gut c
lenched. Xenophon had been right earlier. They needed their suit’s radar. Now he’d have to use his eyes and the lamp-beam that would give him away.
Marten held his breath as he floated through the hatch, his rifle ready. His beam flashed down a curving corridor. In it, more dead floated, both Highborn and cyborg.
“We’re doing this by the numbers,” Marten said. “We stick together and search out each chamber and corridor at a time. I don’t want anyone splitting apart and heading elsewhere.”
The space marines followed him through the corridors. Always, there were the dead HB and the fewer destroyed cyborgs. Once, a cyborg twitched, and seven shells from seven different gyrocs blasted it. There were floating globules of blood and drifting intestines. Jovians floated past severed hands, heads and wrecked plasma cannons.
“Armageddon,” Marten whispered.
Omi clanked his helmet against Marten’s. “What’s that mean?”
“The last battle,” Marten said.
They floated past hatches where bolts of energy flashed wildly. One bolt writhed through the hatch and fused a Jovian to his armor.
“Keep away from the side hatches!” Marten shouted.
Marines scrambled to get away from the energy bolt.
A corridor later, Omi asked, “So where are the cyborgs?”
“They will be in the control chamber,” Felix said.
“Any idea where that is?” asked Marten.
“I think in the very center of the station,” Ah Chen answered. Nadia and she wore combat armor like everyone else, joining them in the assault. There were no safe places here.
In the wash of helmet-lamps, the party pushed and floated through the Sun Station. Because they lacked any schematics, they had to search for the center. There were many curving corridors and endless chambers. Each held their quota of floating dead, battalions of Highborn and always lesser number of cyborgs.
“They killed each other off,” Omi said.
“Keep alert,” Marten said.
“They’re near,” Felix radioed.
“How do you know?” asked Xenophon.
The Highborn grunted, “I know because I feel them.”
Cyborgs hit them seventeen seconds later. In a large, dark area—a cargo-hold was Marten’s guess—the enemy made their move.
With the speed of insects, four suited cyborgs jumped off a corridor wall one after another. They flew into the chamber, firing pulse-rifles: tiny blue energy-bolts streaked across the chamber. They targeted with uncanny accuracy and with amazing speed, maybe three times as fast as what a trained space marine could achieve.
Due to precision shots, eight visors shattered and eight Jovians died. Two pulse rounds sizzled across Felix’s helmet—he’d turned his head fast enough so the armor took the shots. The Highborn reacted faster than any of the space marines. Even as he looked up, he aimed his rotating hand-cannon. With flames of fire, the heavy weapon churned, pushing Felix away from the enemy.
Marten had reacted almost as fast. He berated himself for failing to fire. Instead, he had ducked and he lay on the floor. With his gyroc, he now returned fire.
Hand-cannon slugs tore into a cyborg, foiling its aim, saving Nadia’s life as a pulse-bolt missed her by centimeters. It was too late for Ah Chen, however. Her stomach was blown out by repeated pulse-shots breaching her armor.
Omi fired from the wall. A few other space marines now shot back. APEX shells ignited. A few hit, a very few. Too many shells flew past the cyborgs, exploding uselessly against the already pitted walls.
The cyborgs killed three more marines. Then Felix’s slugs hammered a cyborg visor and smashed through, obliterating the armored brainpan. Together, Marten and Omi killed another.
The last two cyborgs kept tracking and firing, taking out more space marines with frightful skill, inhuman precision. Another cyborg appeared, this one wearing Jovian battle-gear. Osadar used a plasma cannon, firing the area-effect weapon. A roiling orange globule consumed a cyborg, and yet another marine. The last cyborg slammed its hands against its chest. The thing ignited in a terrific explosion, killing five more Jovians. Four cyborgs had slaughtered half the space marines in a matter of moments.
“What now?” Xenophon whispered.
“You stay and help the wounded,” Marten told him. “The rest of you, follow me.” His eyes were watery with rage. How could these things murder men with such ease? “I’m going to take point from here on in.”
“We need a plan,” Omi said. “How are we going to do this?”
Marten couldn’t look at the dead. These men—he sputtered, growing angrier. “Caution seems useless. So we use speed. Attack and fire at whatever you see.”
The last of the space marines flew down the corridors with him. Everyone fired shells into each new heading, often blowing apart the floating dead.
Despite their best efforts, cyborgs hit them again at a junction, taking them from the flank. This time, each cyborg projectile and pulse-round struck Felix. Maybe the cyborgs realized he was the truly dangerous soldier among them.
Felix grunted over the headphones. Dying, he turned, and killed a cyborg with the hand-cannon.
The next few seconds was a maelstrom of weapons-fire. The handful of cyborgs that had ambushed them died. Forty-one seconds later, Marten, Omi, Osadar and two other space marines propelled themselves into the large central chamber of the Sun Station.
Three cyborgs were at various controls. They obviously worked on targeting the Sunbeam. Marten could tell because there were images on the targeting screens of two SU battleships.
Marten fired two shells at one cyborg, swiveled his rifle and was firing at a second enemy even as the meld drew a gun. The first died as the APEX shells blew apart its helmet. The last lost its gun-hand to the shell.
Omi’s shell killed it a second later. The last cyborg died by plasma.
Marten blinked at the dead as he breathed heavily.
“Do you think that’s it?” Omi asked.
“We’ll know soon enough,” Marten said. “Osadar, do you have any idea how to use the equipment?”
“Let us find out,” she said.
-13-
The Prime Web-Mind of Neptune grew impatient. The Sunbeam should have taken out more targets by now. There wasn’t any news of that at all.
At that moment, the Sunbeam reached the Neptune System for a second time. The hellish ray did not fire anywhere near the SU warships, however. Instead, the beam fixed on Triton.
The terrible ray burned through Triton’s negligible nitrogen atmosphere. Then it struck the surface of mostly frozen nitrogen and water-ice crust. The incredible beam chewed through the surface, burning through a cryovolcano.
In a brief span of time, the beam burst through and hit a vast subterranean ocean. The liquid boiled away as vapors steamed in a growing cloud. The beam still struck as it continued to bore deeper into the Neptunian moon.
The Prime knew in a nanosecond that someone else controlled the Sunbeam. This was an emergency, a dire event. In three seconds, it understood that whoever fired the beam meant to destroy the moon. Whoever fired tried to kill it—the marvel of the universe. That could never occur. There was only one possible solution now.
The armored chamber holding the Prime’s brain domes lifted. Jets fired and the chamber shook. Slowly, the great armored room slid through wide corridors as it headed for the great elevator.
The Prime ran through outlandish scenarios. Cooling chemicals kept hysteria at bay, kept panic from guiding its logic. Given its uniqueness and greatness, it would be an inconceivable loss to the Solar System if it should perish.
I am the Prime, the singularity of existence.
The armored chamber headed for a large oval vessel. The vessel was bigger than an SU battleship, although it would never willingly engage in a fight. The size was for the unique equipment, for the experimental Fuhl Mechanism.
As the armored chamber moved up the elevator, as debris slammed against the roof, as Tri
ton-quakes shook the planetoid, the hideous Sunbeam kept burning. Time was running against it.
As the Prime’s chamber slid into the belly of the great ship, the Sunbeam boiled the subterranean ocean at a fantastic rate. Seconds passed into minutes and the minutes crawled as the Prime’s vessel slowly lifted off the moon.
The Sunbeam now burst through the subterranean ocean as it bored for the core.
The enemy must desire vengeance. How else to explain this crime against the universe? The Prime knew it was unique, a gift to reality. The thoughtless Homo sapiens with their small thinking must yearn to destroy Triton as Mars’ moon Phobos had once been destroyed, as South American Sector on Earth had been destroyed.
This cannot happen to me. I am the Prime. I am the greatest life in the Solar System, probably in the entire galaxy.
The beam began to move now across Triton’s moonscape. The great vessel slowly lifted for space as the beam moved faster, sweeping the surface and coming dangerously near the ship.
* * *
On the Vladimir Lenin, Hawthorne crowded next to Blackstone and Kursk as they watched the module.
“The beam is going to destroy the moon,” Hawthorne whispered.
Kursk blinked several times. “Sir, there’s a communications, an emergency message,” she said, pointing at a blinking light on the panel.
Hawthorne tore his gaze from the incredible sight of the vast beam. “Put it on,” he said.
It was a short message. It came from Cone on Earth. According to her, the Sun-Works Factory had been destroyed.
“What?” Hawthorne said. “How did that happen?”
The message was over four hours old. Therefore, Cone hadn’t heard the question. She did tell them, however, that an amazing beam from the Sun had demolished the Highborn headquarters.
“A Sunbeam,” Hawthorne said. “That’s what we’ve been witnessing. What happened back in Inner Planets?”
“Sir!” said Blackstone. “Look! Is that a ship?”
Kursk was already bringing the object into sharper focus. It was oval, lifting from Triton’s disintegrating surface.
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