Horsemen United: Horsemen Origins Books 1-5

by Benjamin Hartman

  “Shall we try to recruit him sir?” Red asked.

  “My power cell is at 15 percent Red, we don’t have that kind of time,” Houston replied.

  “Very well then,” Red said as he reached down and ripped the energy cell out of the mech’s left arm. It’s attention was drawn to its shoulders, but the moment it stopped firing on Houston he powered down his shield and grabbed ahold of the right arm.

  “Hop down Red,” Houston said as he jerked the arm out of his way, and fired at the mech’s processor at the base of its metal skull. A short burst from his rifle silenced the war machine.

  The lumbering mech collapsed, smoke rising from its neck. Red retrieved the processor and plugged it into his mainframe to learn how these droids operated.

  “How many more of them are there?” Houston asked.

  “I’m still flying blind!” Hacker screamed. He didn’t know what to do. Every trick and tactic he’d utilized before had failed here. He had nothing left.

  “Seriously?” Houston snapped. “Red, you’re up. The kid can’t do it.”

  “Sir if I may finish my task at hand,” Red replied.

  “Hurry up,” Houston growled. “How do they communicate?”

  “They seem to be on their own private security network which they access only twice a day.”

  “Mmm. Fascinating. How does it see?” Houston asked.

  “Visually? It appears to be infrared. In fact, I speculate that they can see you right here sir.”

  “Then let’s do something they won’t see coming. Sol, fire up the new recruits.”

  Hacker tapped all over the screen. He was frozen in place, broken images flickering in and out of existence. He tried to reestablish a connection with his Wrecking Crew, but he couldn’t hear anything.

  “They want to keep me out? They’ll have to try harder than that. It’s time to burn down the forest,” Hacker said as he pulled a chip out of his pocket. Despite the frozen screen, he could still open local files, and he clicked on one called ‘Forest Fire.’

  “Red, let’s go after the other bastards,” Houston said. The two followed the map Hacker had provided until they reached the warehouse. There was another Gladiator class mech waiting for them along with thousands upon thousands of battle droids powered down and hanging off the racks.

  “We didn’t bring a big enough freighter ship sir,” Red said.

  “Yeah, there’s a few more than I anticipated,” Houston replied. He activated his wrist shield right as the mech opened fire on the intruders. Red leaped down onto the floor, but the mech was onto him. It sprayed the room with it’s gatling gun, going after Red.

  Houston jumped over the stair railing, but his legs jolted in pain as he landed. “Shit, I’m getting too old for this,” He cursed. He marched forward, firing at the mech’s skull. The droid blocked the assault with its shoulder pads. It’s yellow eyes became fixated on Houston while Red flanked in from the side.

  Houston noticed movement out of the corner of his eye. The racks lit up and the claws opened. Human sized droids fell from the racks and set their sights on the Gladiator fighting Houston.

  “All units converge on the assailant,” One of the droids said. They cocked their rifles and opened fire, but the mech activated its orbital shield just in time.

  The blasterfire looked like pebbles being thrown into a small pond. Only tiny ripples shimmered off the surface.

  The mech realized that it was being surrounded. Houston could see the confusion as the processors were determining whether it should attack the units that it was sworn to protect.

  It gave Houston the moment he needed.

  Hacker weaved a tapestry of commands as he raced to issue his program. The security agents moved fast, too fast to be humans. He had to be battling a block chain run by AIs. They were attempting to overwhelm his servers and they were proving successful. However, Hacker’s program hadn’t failed before, even in the face of an AI block chain.

  Hacker opened the file’s script and issued the commands he needed to activate his program. Once activated, the script surged through a series of windows and commands at blinding speed, a system that he could barely control. It was a dangerous program, and he knew it.

  The program named ‘Forest Fire’ tore through the block chains and rooted out the AI from their systems. One by one, the groups hold on Hacker’s system was torn asunder, and there was nothing they could do about it. Once he was able to communicate with them, Hacker ordered the Wrecking Crew to assist in his malware assault against the enemy.

  As his malware attacked the AIs, Hacker’s chamber unfroze, and he was able to see the entire foundry in real time. He saw that a third mech was coming for Houston and Red. As he searched the screen, a tiny notification caught his eye. It was a timer for when the mech was to connect with the private security server and receive updates.

  Hacker realized that this was the key to bringing the mechs down.

  They may not be connected with the foundry’s servers, but their timers are. If he could change the timer to notify the mech that it was time for an update, that would open the mech’s ports and make it vulnerable to his attacks.

  When he looked back at the screen, Hacker saw the humanoid droids attacking the mech and assisting Houston.

  “What are you doing Hacker?” Sol asked. His voice became raspy and cracked.

  “Oh no!” Hacker shouted. “My program is going after them isn’t it?!”

  “It seems so,” Sol replied. “I have to go now.”

  “No! Sol, help me!” Hacker pleaded, but it was too late. Sol had already retreated back into his body and left the cyberrealm.

  Hacker attempted to terminate his forest fire program, but it had already reached the battle droids on the ground.

  Houston reached through the mech’s shield and tore out the energy cell which powered its defenses. The humming came to a stop, and the shields fell. However, the battle droids ceased firing as they looked to each other in confusion.

  “What the hell…?” Houston asked.

  He watched in horror as all of the battle droids collapsed, inert on the ground.

  The mech’s hideous eyes focused on Houston.

  “Shit.”

  The mech swung its massive arm, knocking Houston back almost 30 metres. It felt as though there was an explosion in his chest, and the edges of his vision blurred. The mech wheeled up, intending to finish him off.

  Just as the mech reached Houston, a behemoth of metal landed in front of him.

  “Sorry Master Houston, but I’m going to need to borrow this. My batteries are far more efficient than yours,” Sol said as he removed Houston’s hand and retrieved his shield unit.

  “Go for it,” Houston replied weakly. Sol put the shield device back into his chest and activated it as the mech opened fire on him. Sol lunged forward, striking the mech with his massive fists, knocking pieces out of the war droid. The mech’s guns proved unwieldy in hand to hand combat, which is where Sol excelled. The mech tried to retreat, but Sol grabbed the gatling gun. He pulled the mech in, and unleashed his pneumatic arm, which pancaked the mech’s face into a pile of scrap.

  Right as Sol finished the mech off, another one charged in. It launched a missile at Houston, but Sol jumped in the way.

  Houston felt the wave of heat as the missile slammed into Sol’s shields. He flew back into the wall, his shield generator sparking from being overwhelmed.

  The mech wheeled forward and pointed its gatling gun at the group. Houston closed his eyes as he steeled himself for the end.

  A hissing noise broke the silence. Houston opened his eyes and saw the mech convulsing, until the unit finally powered down before him, as if bowing in submission.

  Hacker cheered. “I got ‘im! All of the droids are down! The foundry is yours!”

  Houston groaned as he felt the pain in his ribs worsen. His breathing was shallow, and his torso was becoming black.

  “Red, see if you can get Sol running again,” Hou
ston ordered.

  “Yes sir,” Red replied, who tended to the fallen golem.

  Houston reached down and ripped off the mech’s head lying on the ground and crushed the metal skull in front of the camera.

  “That’s what I think of your programming!” Houston hissed.

  Hacker felt a wave of shame overtake him. “I saved you! Why are you getting pissed at me?”

  “We had this handled. Your interference caused me and Sol to get taken out!”

  “But I was flying blind and-”

  “Hacker, you need learn how to solve problems, not make more of them!” Houston snapped as he pulled the comm piece out of his ear. He walked to the droids scattered on the floor and began hooking them back to the racks.

  Hacker shut down the Chamber and buried his face in his hands. Stomach acid swirled in his gut as shame and humiliation took hold of his mind. He wanted to help Houston, to make this better for him, but felt as though he’d made things worse. Houston was holding his side, but how could he have known what would happen?

  The next three days felt like an eternity as Hacker mulled over the mission in his head. He felt like a failure, that he had no worth, that he was beyond redemption. He stewed in his misery, waiting for Houston’s return.

  The door to the sanctum groaned as it opened to receive a massive cargo ship lowering into the warehouse. The ship sat atop three cargo containers which housed the thousands of battle droids that Houston planned to sell to the Coalition Government.

  A shivering nausea took root in Hacker’s stomach as Houston walked out of the ship.

  “Get the droids processed and reach out to our contacts on Centaura,” Houston ordered.

  “That’s it?!” Hacker screamed. “That’s all you have to say after three days?!”

  Houston sighed. “Your mistake was in targeting a foundry where the security was run by AIs. Sure you seized access through one of their user profiles, but you should’ve targeted a foundry where the security was run by humans. Humans make mistakes with their coding, machines don’t.”

  “Wait, you knew how to hack into the droid facility?” Hacker asked.

  “Of course I do!” Houston snapped. “You think I haven’t done this before? I was a mech runner when you were still wearing diapers!”

  “Then why didn’t you give me instructions on what to do?”

  “Because I need a code breaker who can think for himself! Who doesn’t need me to hold his hand every time he meets some resistance!”

  “I did that and you got pissed at me!”

  “It’s a tough universe kid. Welcome to it.”

  “What makes you think you’re so great at coding?”

  “Well, for starters, I was one of the developers of the Atrium language.”

  Hacker gasped. “You said you were a mathematician! Not one of the developers of the most powerful AI language known to man!”

  “There’s a lot of math in robotics kid.” Houston replied.

  “This…this is incredible! How did you develop the language?”

  “Look kid, there’s nothing special about it. We designed Atrium to be one of the hardest languages for techies to learn, but it still sparked an AI arms race. Within a year there were a dozen AIs all streaming through cyberspace. Some went and exterminated villages, others are as docile as Red and Sol here. All depends on who wrote ‘em.”

  “How advanced did you get with Atrium?”

  “It was a dead end. Just like every other attempt at consciousness with machines. Red was my first. Good servant, excellent strategist, but can’t think for himself. Sol was the second attempt utilizing one of the offshoot evolving scripts like what you saw in those droids. Came close to full consciousness with my philosophizing droid, but in the end, all he does is recite old quotes which makes him sound deeper than he is.

  “One head cannot hold all wisdom,” Sol said.

  “Yeah, yeah. We get it,” Houston replied.

  “What happened to the Atrium project then?” Hacker asked.

  “The Core marked us as terrorists!” Houston screamed. “We unleashed a technology they couldn’t contain! People had been trying to develop a working model for customizing AIs that mankind could control and we were the ones who succeeded! The Core hunted us down one by one, destroyed all public copies of Atrium and then utilized the program in their droid foundries. My compatriots are all gone now, and I’m forced to hide out in shit holes like this one, fighting for a cause I don’t believe in, to kill a bunch of kids I don’t know to finish a war I didn’t start.”

  Hacker wanted to say something, but words failed him. Houston seemed like a man on a mission, but with no allegiance to anyone or anything. He was a zealous mercenary, a man driven by an paradoxical ideology even he couldn’t define.

  For over three years, Hacker studied under Houston as the two became the most infamous mech runners in the galaxy and the Core’s most wanted. Their skill was unmatched by anyone within the Core as they hijacked supply ships and foundries that sought to replenish the Core’s droid forces. Despite their help, the Coalition forces were being driven back to the edges of known space.

  On Centaura, Hacker was socializing with some of the Coalition freedom fighters, listening to their ideas of liberty, trade and freedom. They were die-hards ravaged by war, but they would give all they had to ensure their families would have a better future. Hacker wished them well and was chuckling to himself as the two men sat down for dinner.

  “These guys are something,” Hacker said. “Their conviction is astounding, I only wish there was more we could do to help them.”

  “Now you know the most dangerous weapon known to man: ideas. There’s nothing more we can do for them. If anything, we’re going to pull the plug on this operation.”

  “What?! Why?”

  “Because they can’t win this war. It’s time to focus our efforts in preparation for a Core victory and to ready our assets to be protected when that happens.”

  “How do you know the Core will win?”

  “I knew the Core would win the moment they issued their bombing run on Calliope. Once the Core started attacking unarmed civilian worlds, it was all over.”

  “The Coalition could still win!”

  “Don’t let your ideologies cloud your logic Hacker! The Coalition won’t attack civilian worlds, which means they can’t break the Core’s morale. The Core on the other hand, doesn’t care about public opinion and will do whatever it takes to win this war. Someone needs to tell those boys that close only counts in horse shoes and hand grenades.”

  The rest of their dinner was eaten in silence as Hacker mulled over Houston’s words. He hated to admit it, but they made sense. However, Hacker didn’t believe they were as powerless to influence events as Houston did.

  “What if we turn to economic terrorism?” Hacker asked.

  “Huh?”

  “We use our AIs to target the Core markets. Their financial system is designed to keep people distracted while this war is going on. Nobody on Earth realizes they’re fighting a war. What if we cause a market collapse and make them feel the pain of going against the Coalition?”

  “It’s a bold plan I’ll give it to you, but it’s too expensive, too much time, too much effort and most importantly: too late. As I said, let’s focus our efforts towards the end of the war. I’ve secured a base on the last Coalition stronghold and-”

  “No! I’m not ready to give up!” Hacker snapped. “This is a good plan, you just admitted it!”

  “Kid, this is our reality. I stole the schematics for a droid foundry the size of a small moon that the Coalition has been building. When the Coalition loses, it will be destroyed or handed over to the Core as reparations. However, if a private individual were to make this foundry disappear, the Core wouldn’t dare come after them since it would churn out more droids in a year than soldiers they can recruit. A person in control of a foundry like this would be untouchable, and I intend to be that person.”

 
; “Listen to you!” Hacker hissed. “You sound more like a mob boss than a freedom fighter.

  “I’m a realist who only backs the winning side!” Houston snapped. “I was on the losing side once! I do not intend to be on that side again!” He screamed as he held up his arm. He rose up and stormed off, putting an end to the conversation.

  Hacker stewed in silence. He had to prove Houston wrong, that his ideas were worth pursuing. He left the table, went inside the Chamber and brought up the Core news feed about the markets. He summoned his Wrecking Crew, and went to work.

  “Stupid Core. They think their trust and stability in the economy will keep them safe? That they can ignore the Coalition’s cause? They’ll pay attention now,” Hacker sneered as he minimized his script and turned to the newscast. The indices gauging the Core markets began to blink. What was once an array of green upticks ceased, and morphed into a band of red downticks. The charts held their apex for a moment, the teetered downward. Within seconds the descent turned into a freefall. The news anchors stopped in mid newscast as they watched the indices fall by the hundreds, and then the thousands. They sat by in horror, and silence reigned on the screen. Hacker smiled with his hands clasped in front of his face.

  He watched as billions in wealth evaporated in seconds, and was mesmerized when the anchors were forced to report that they had no idea what was happening to the markets.

  Hacker shut down the Chamber and exited. Houston stormed right towards him.

  “What the hell did you just do?” Houston screamed.

  “You said it’d be too long and too expensive. I infiltrated the biggest investment firms, coded an AI to go in, issue a ‘Sell’ order on their biggest holdings, and then repeated. All at a cost of a few minutes of time and bandwidth.”

  Houston groaned. “It won’t take them long to recover from that! Your attack generated a little media buzz, but those traders will reverse everything you’ve done! You didn’t accomplish anything, you set them back maybe a day or two.”

  “What is it then?!” Hacker snapped. “What should I be doing? I’ve been here for three years and you don’t instruct me on how to do anything! I learned only by watching you and your only capability seems to be in relentlessly criticizing my work!”