by Andrew Beery
Kens stood up and approached the screen. “Sir, how about this. How about you and a small contingent of guards of your choosing come onboard the Yorktown. I give you my word as an officer and as a gentleman that you will be given safe passage to and from my ship. Take the time to talk with Admiral Kimbridge. Listen and look at what she has to show you. Make your best case in person. Isn’t that better than starting a shooting war that neither of us wants?”
Chapter 23: GCP Fulcrum…
Marine Sergeant Hernandez from the GCP Hedison, edged forward slowly. Behind him five other marines moved with equal stealth. Their Stark Mark Nine combat suits lacked some of the refinements of the Mark Ten Heshe nanite-enhanced suits that the Yorktown’s crew used but they were nonetheless very capable systems.
Hernandez toggled his HUD. The heads up display showed four people in the room to the right and another six about a kilometer away. This beast of a ship was big. He waved two of his team forward.
Their mission was to infiltrate the Alpha platform and determine the level of resistance a full assault would face. So far with only ten actives from the Yorktown it seemed like it would be a cakewalk. He knew though that looks could be deceiving. There was an old soldier’s adage. ‘All combat was a democracy and your opponent always got a vote.’
He toggled his sub vocal mic and whispered “Gunny, I have four locals and another half dozen hostiles one klick out.”
“Got ya team leader one. Team two is advancing on the six further out. Hold your position until they get on target. Be prepared to move in and secure your area. If the opposition looks minimal we may as well go ahead and take it out.”
“Orders acknowledged, Hernandez out”
***
WhimPy watched the incursion with a detached sense of curiosity. Admiral Kimbridge had left to return to the GCP Yorktown. She had left ten of her assault team behind to aid WhimPy in his assimilation of the now defunct Alpha platform.
Once his highly evolved Heshe nanites had thoroughly infiltrated the Uruk platform he would be able to rapidly reconfigure and repair the various subsystems that composed the massive weapons platform. That would be a lengthy process simply by virtue of the massive ship’s size. To aid in this effort he had a number of drones carrying containers of his construction nanites throughout the ship. However, due to heavy damage inflicted on the platform during his battles with it, there were a number of areas that remained difficult to access. These were the areas that WhimPy had requested the Admiral’s assistance with.
Normally he would have simply dealt with these issues himself but because of the need to have his new body fully functional as soon as possible, WhimPy had requested the aid. Every moment he remained in potentially hostile space without full access to his abilities was a moment where lives could be lost due to a misunderstanding or an ill-conceived intent on the part of the GCP.
It seemed strange to think of the galactic Coalition of Planets as a hostile but their actions of late had forced a reassessment of his relationship with them. His analytics subroutine had started to develop a hypothesis as to why the GCP was changing. If his suspicions were correct the recently defeated Alpha platform may have been the lessor of the threats facing the GCP.
His internal sensor net detected four teams of six marines each working their way through the various corridors that made up his body. One team was guarding the entry point that they and the Kimbridge contingent had used to gain access to the platform. Another was motionless near his backup core. The third team was heading towards a cluster of fusion generators that WhimPy had just managed to get back online. The final team was the one that concerned him most.
In the course of taking over the Alpha weapons platform, WhimPy had located, disabled and isolated a number of redundant Alpha AI cores. Without power and without access to sensors, weapons, and navigation or drive systems these cores did not represent a significant threat. That said, the fourth incursion team was heading toward Lieutenant Stone’s team near the only one of these backup cores that had represented a potential concern. The power feeds to that AI had been intact. When the fusion generators came back online the core powered up and began casting about with the few systems it had access to in an effort to determine what was going on.
It was that casting about that drew WhimPy’s attention. He had immediately dispatched the Lieutenant’s team with a number of construction nanite cylinders so that he could subsume the rogue AI.
While the Lieutenant had been able to isolate the core, there were too many available power feeds to completely power it down quickly. They were even now placing more of the nanite canisters so that WhimPy could complete the task. The risk was that the incursion force could delay the operation and thus complicate the situation needlessly.
WhimPy opened a channel to the Yorktown forces. “Lieutenant Stone and Sergeant Moore. Please be advised you have visitors moving into your respective AO’s. There are twenty four marines from the GCP Hedison in four groups. One group is guarding access port A12. A second is near Sergeant Moore’s position but seems to be holding in place. The third group is attempting to access the primary fusion generators. I’ve erected shields that should prevent them from accessing those power system. The fourth group is approaching your position Lieutenant.”
“WhimPy,” Lieutenant Stone replied, “Can you determine their intent?”
“I do not have access to their encrypted quantum communications. However a heuristic analysis of their actions to date would suggest they are attempting to assume control of this station.”
“Can they?”
“Negative, but they could complicate matters if they interfere with you efforts to shut down that backup AI core you attempting to isolate. If the core gains access to one or more of the weapons systems before I can stop it… the Alpha AI could do serious damage to Earth’s biosphere.”
“How close are they?” Stone asked even as he pushed his men to move faster.
“That their current pace they should be in your vicinity in less than five minutes.”
“Thanks for the heads up 101. We will take it from here.”
“Lieutenant, one more thing...”
“There always is…”
“The men are wearing Mark Nine Combat suits. They are equipped with stealth technology. It is not as advanced as the Mark Ten’s but if they stand still you will have a difficult time spotting them.”
“That’s worth knowing. Thanks.”
***
AG explained the situation to his team and instructed them to hurry and get their nanites deployed as fast as they could. He and four of his men dropped their packages off in the proscribed predesignated locations WhimPy had indicated. The fifth man, Private First Class Jackson had trouble reaching his target and so was a few minutes slower than the rest.
He was walking up to the rest of the group with a self-satisfied smile on his face when a pointer plasma beam materialized out of nowhere and hit him in the back. Although they could be lethal, the discharge from a pointer rifle was typically used to stun an opponent.
Fortunately for Jackson the pointer in question was set to stun. His Stark suit was capable of absorbing most of the energy from a stun blast but it would still hurt. Jackson, to his credit, dropped in a heap on the floor without uttering a sound… just like he had been trained. Opponents unfamiliar with the specific abilities of the Mark Ten would have no reason to suspect he was anything other than unconscious.
“Men fall back,” AG ordered.
“Lieutenant, this is Lieutenant Commander Crosby Davis from the Hedison. We have taken control of this weapons system. You and your man are ordered to stand down.”
“Men, engage cloaks,” AG ordered. “Lieutenant Commander … Davis did you say?”
“Tell your men to deactivate their Starks, Lieutenant… that is an order.”
“Beg’n the Lieutenant Commander’s pardon sir. But you are not in my chain of command. I do not recognize your authority to give me orders
.”
“So that’s the way you want to play this Lieutenant? Marine fighting marine?”
“My name is Stone. Anthony Grant Stone. I have no desire to fight you.”
“Then don’t, Lieutenant Stone. How we proceed is entirely up to you.”
“So if I order my men to power down their Starks, except for the gravity plating on their boots, and to surrender their arms you will not shoot us out of hand?”
“Of course not son. We are all marines here,” Lieutenant Commander Davis said with an air of fatherly compassion.
AG stood up and deactivated most of the systems on his Stark suit. Given his recent enhancements the suit would only slow him down. He placed his weapon and backpack carefully on the ground.
“Men,” he ordered, “Deactivate you suits and relinquish your arms.”
As they did so the team from the Hedison disabled their cloaking fields.
“Smart move son. We are going to get along just fine,” a tall marine said as he walked over to where Lieutenant Stone was standing. He kicked away the younger man’s weapon and started to pull one of his arms down to fasten magnetic restraints on it. That was when AG made his move.
Now that he could see where each of his opponents were, without their cloaks on, he could take action.
In one superhumanly fast motion he reversed the Commander’s grip and placed the magnetic shackles on him. Next he threw the startled officer five feet in the air into the two men standing behind him. That was three of the six down. Just three more to go.
The first of the three tried to bring his pointer up and fire it at the blur that was Lieutenant Stone. Even though he was a good fifteen feet away, Stone was on him before he could finish swinging his weapon up. As the corporal pulled the trigger, AG pushed the barrel around with his bare hand to point at one of the other Hedison marines who was still standing.
The beam hit him square on the chest. Mark Nine Stark suits didn’t have the same level of shielding that the Mark Ten’s did and so the marine in question crumpled – another victim of friendly fire.
AG had just turned to face his last opponent when he felt an electric tingle surge over his body. He knew had he been unenhanced he would be down. As it was he stumbled… slightly dazed… but still on his feet. The last marine from the Hedison seemed amazed that his pointer had not dropped his target. He knew he got a clean shot in. He started to raise his weapon for a second go at it when he himself was hit by a pointer blast. He crumpled like a rag doll.
Private Jackson stood back up with his rifle in his hand.
“Tisk tisk,” the young private said. “Didn’t your drill sergeant teach you to never assume an enemy is out?”
***
Commodore Clarkson stood at top of the ramp of his shuttle facing the flight deck of the GCP Yorktown. How many times had he dreamt of standing here as a young boy? And yet now that he was here there were few places in the universe he would rather not be.
Admiral Catherine Kimbridge stood just outside his shuttle door at the base of the ramp. With her was a security detail and the man he had talked to before, Captain Ken Kirkland. Clarkson walked down the ramp.
“Captain, permission to come aboard?”
Ken looked at Cat. Failure to recognize a superior office was a severe breach of protocol but given the current situation he supposed it was understandable. Cat for her part smiled wanly and gave Ken the barest of nods.
“Permission granted Commodore. Welcome onboard the Yorktown.”
“I wish I could said it’s a pleasure to be here but we have some serious business to discuss.” With that he turned to face Cat.
“Doctor Kimbridge, while I greatly respect what you have done for Earth and the GCP I find myself in an awkward position.”
Cat smiled and stuck out her hand to shake his. He hesitated but then relented and shook her hand back. This seemed to break the ice.
“Commodore,” Cat said gravely, “I have some information that impacts the very future of the GCP that I need to share with you… But in order to do so I need to be sure with whom I am sharing it. With your permission I want to take you by our medical bay and show you some equipment we recovered. While we are there I want our doctor to do a quick scan of you and your security detail. You have my word that it will be done quickly and will be non-invasive.”
Clarkson motioned for his security detail to follow them as they took the turbo lift to the medical deck. He wasn’t sure what he was expecting. The Yorktown was officially classified as a renegade vessel and yet it operated with the spit and polish of the premiere flagship it had once been. As they passed crewmen in the wide corridors the crewman stood off to the side and saluted as they passed. What the Commodore did not know was that Cat had put an end to courtesy protocols during normal ship operations. The only reason it was in place now was because Captain Kirkland had announced over the public address system that a flag officer was visiting and all courtesy protocols should be observed for the duration.
In the medical bay Doctor Pulaski ran a hand scanner over each member of the party from the Fulcrum. “They are clean Admiral,” she reported at last.
“That being the case, let me share some information you many find both interesting and deeply disturbing,” Cat said to the Commodore. Their first stop was the Ashtoreth bio-generator.
Chapter 24: Conspiracy Theories…
“So you mean to tell me there are six Bud Faragon’s running around?” Commodore Clarkson said in disbelief. He was sitting in the Yorktown’s conference room where for the last hour Admiral Kimbridge had been briefing him on the Ashtoreth plot to subjugate the GCP. A plot that involved replicants, a fake plague, gene drive technology and a major advancement in hyperjump technology.
“Actually, no,” Cat answered. “First we believe one or more of the replicants may have been killed in a recent attack aimed at destroying evidence on the Hupenstanii home world. Second, since the Admiral’s engrams were never transferred to the replicants, they were at best physical facsimiles.”
“And there is an outside entity called the Ashtoreth that is responsible for all of this? What could they hope to gain?”
Cat leaned forward. “Think about it Commodore. The GCP has fought and won war after war. We’ve battled everything from Uruk weapon platforms to the Modos Syndicate. We’ve faced and beaten all comers… no matter what the odds.
“Now suppose you are an alien race whose very way of life is predicated on expansion. For generation after generation you survive by taking over territory. No matter how big and bad you are… sooner or later you are…”
“Going to run into somebody bigger and ‘badder’,” Commodore Clarkson finished for her. “How does that tie into what we are talking about?”
“Because,” Cat continued, “If you know that sooner or later you are going to run into somebody that you cannot beat by strength of arms… you develop a new strategy for accomplishing your goals. That is what I believe we are seeing in the Ashtoreth.”
Cat waved at the holographic charts that were floating in front of the wall in the conference room. “First the Ashtoreth replace select individuals in the target population. Leaders and people in a position to influence others. Remember, the Ashtoreth are playing the long game. They tweak the very fabric of the societies they are striving to conquer in an effort to make them weaker and more pliable.”
“So that explains the replicant technology. They are literally replacing our leaders with their cronies,” Clarkson added as the pieces finally began to come together for him.
Cat stood up and poured herself a cup of coffee. “I suspect very few of the actual leaders have been replaced. I think they learned from Admiral Faragon just how dangerous it was if they got too close to the seats of power. I suspect most of the doppelgangers that have been placed will be speech writers and personal assistants. People in a position to influence but not themselves in the limelight.”
“Admiral Faragon?”
“I think he was
the exception. The Hupenstanii solved the hyperfield jump problem that had literally reshaped society. Replacing him was intended to suppress that technology so that it could remain in the exclusive domain of the Ashtoreth. When the Admiral got into a near fatal accident their replicants became useless and were forced to find a new way to achieve their goals.”
Commodore Clarkson looked first at Captain Kirkland and then at Admiral Kimbridge. “OK, suppose I buy all of this. How do the Hupenstanii fit into the puzzle? Why play this game with an incurable contagion?”
Cat sat back down with her coffee. “Several reasons Commodore. First, they had to contain the hyperfield jump discovery. That they could have done with a few simple murders but remember what I said earlier. The Ashtoreth are in this for the long game. Creating a GCP wide emergency allowed them to put players into motion to destabilize the GCP. The sweeping powers that the Grand Senate essentially gave themselves in response to the Hupenstanii emergency would have been unthinkable to the founders. I know because I am one of them. The Bureau of Commerce Investigation is but one example. There isn’t a citizen alive within the Coalition that doesn’t live in fear of the BCI.”
Ken looked the Commodore in the eye. His expression deadly serious. “Sir, as the Admiral said, the Hupenstanii situation advances the Ashtoreth goals on several fronts.” He looked at Admiral Kimbridge for permission to continue. She nodded.
“The Ashtoreth are experimenting with a gene-drive technology that literally allows them to hold an entire race hostage. Imagine what would happen if every man or woman became sterile in just a handful of generations. Sterile because the basic fundamental genetic makeup of the species can no longer produced fertile progeny. Imagine the powers-that-be recognize the threat and they get offered a cure. What would they not do in order to have access to it?”
“Are you saying this is what they did to the Hupenstanii?”