by Kal Spriggs
Mel pulled her helmet down and then closed her visor. Her suit had replenished its air supplies since the EVA across the hull. She’d be fine for several hours again. Her suit beeped as Bob sent out a radio frequency for them to speak on.
“Lead on.”
***
Nothing had prepared her for the massive noise and size of the engine room.
She knew the ship’s size, and the massive amount of support it needed to function as a warship. She knew that that required massive reactors and dozens of support systems.
Even so, the scale of the engine room startled her; it was vast. The two massive fusion reactors took up most of the space. On most warships, the two reactors would have separate engine rooms, in case of a lucky hit.
That wasn’t the case here.
The thrum of the reactors rose up through the deck to vibrate her body. Tangles of piping and pumps, as well as thick electrical conduits, jutted everywhere. She frowned, unable to take it all in. She knew some kind of order lay in the apparent chaos, but it was beyond her to see.
“Conduit we want is on lower level.” Stasia said. Even with the suit radio, Mel could barely hear her over the background noise.
Mel checked the radiation meter on the arm of her suit and winced. Bob hadn’t lied; the reactors ran with little or no shielding. Only the heavy armored bulkhead prevented the rest of the ship from a flood of radiation at a lethal dose.
The suit would protect her.
Luckily the background radiation didn’t come near the levels from space, kept out by the ship’s radiation shield. That kind of radiation would have fried them like eggs, suits or no.
“What are we looking for?” Mel asked.
Stasia waved her datapad, “Is conduit. Heavy cable. We want specific one.” She started down a ladder. “Level Two is where we can access it easiest.”
***
Colonel Frost reached the engine room door to find Rawn with Smith and his team.
“Any sign of them?” Frost asked.
Rawn held up a pair of long, blonde hairs. “My sister’s still alive anyway.”
“And determined to do something,” Frost grimaced. How had things gone so wrong? He passed over his pocket notepad.
Rawn read what he’d written. “You sure about this?” His voice sounded uncertain.
“Our only option.” Frost growled. For the sake of the AI, he spoke, “We’ll head down. They’ll probably target one of the reactors. I’ll take the port, you take the starboard. You know what to do?”
Rawn nodded, “You know what to look for?”
Frost pointed at one of his men, “Hugh knows enough.”
“Okay.” Rawn took a deep breath. “Good luck, Colonel.”
“Stop wasting time,” Fenris said. The strange, multi-tonal voice had grown more pronounced. Frost wondered if the AI had begun to lose it. He hoped not. He wanted it to understand what he did to it right before it ceased to be.
“Let’s go, men.”
***
“Why can’t they label this crap?” Bob said. He kicked an inoffensive pipe. “You can’t pull up a better description?”
Mel couldn’t blame him for his frustration. Two hours spent just in the one room left her feeling the same way.
“Is all I can do. One of these power lines is main source for AI.” Stasia said. She’d led them to a small chamber off the starboard side of the main engine room. Thick, messy tangles of piping and conduits fed through it.
“This is ridiculous,” Mel said. “Maybe we can trace it from the reactors.” She looked out the open hatch and froze. Slowly, she pulled her head back inside.
“We’ve got company,” she said.
“Where?” Brian asked. He’d already drawn his pistol with his right hand. It would have looked reassuring except for how he was leaning against the wall for support. Brave words or no, he looked to be nearing his physical limit.
“Coming down the starboard ladder,” Mel said. She couldn’t stop the twinge of worry in her voice. “My brother’s with them.” She’d recognized the environmental suit she'd bought him for his last birthday.
Bob peeked around the corner. “Frost and four others on the port side, too. Eleven of them altogether.”
“Why are they here?” she asked. She frowned, suddenly worried for her brother. She didn’t like the thought of a firefight in here; if nothing else, they’d all die if a stray bullet opened the wrong pipe.
“Looking for us?” Stasia suggested.
Bob watched them for a moment in silence. “No… they’re alert, but they’re not searching.”
“Why would they come here then?”
Brian looked at Swaim, “You said you made two programs?”
“Yeah, uh, one of them they used. I doubt they’d use the other one,” he said.
“What did you call the other one?” Mel asked. She felt a sudden and irrational concern for the AI. She couldn’t help it; the computer was just too human.
“Uh, it’s like a lobotomy,” Swaim said. “Only it targeted the AI’s morality programming. I wrote it in case the AI didn’t want to follow some of Frost’s orders.”
“Like what?” Bob asked, “Closing off a section of ship and venting us to space?”
“That’s a point,” Marcus said. “The ship tried to contain us before. It didn’t try to actively kill us before then.”
“So, you think Frost lobotomized the AI?” Mel asked with sudden anger. “Yeah, but if he did that… Stasia, can you and Swaim check the AI?”
“What for?” Stasia asked as she typed at her datapad.
“Well, check to see if Frost is still in control,” Bob said. “If he pushed the AI over the edge… it might have gone unstable. Then… that might explain why he’s here.”
“What do you mean?” Brian asked. “You think he’s here to do what we’re here for?”
“I have it,” Stasia said. “The AI has locked four of the terrorists in a section. It has initiated preparations to vent that section.”
“He took hostages,” Mel said. “Good for him.”
“Yeah, except he’s now operating in kill opposition mode,” Swaim said, his voice trembling. “He’s definitely gone unstable. It’s like – I dunno, like he’s insane. There are entire sections of his logic, his thoughts, that are just gibberish now.”
“Fucking humans,” Brian muttered. “Always got to break the things they make.” Mel wondered if he’d said that over the radio because he wanted to be heard, or if blood loss had made him light-headed enough not to realize.
“So, why is Frost down here, then?” she asked. “I don’t think he’s likely to forgive the computer for taking his men hostage.”
“No.” Bob said. “He’s more likely to cut his losses.” He pulled back from the doorway. “You said his men had prepared that bomber drone? I think he’s getting ready to use it.”
“What?” Marcus asked, “Why?”
Mel shivered. Suddenly she understood Bob’s meaning. “When some of his men were hurt too bad to go on, he killed them. Mercy killing, you might say.” She cleared her throat, “If he thinks the AI will kill his men anyway, he’ll make sure he’ll get his revenge.”
Bob nodded, “He’s not here for us. He’s here to cause the reactors to overload.”
***
Frost grimaced as a pair of repair robots scuttled past. He’d long since begun to hate this ship. Now he loathed it. “Find what you need, Hugh?”
“Yes, Colonel. I’ll need a couple minutes.”
“Take your time. The rest of us will search for the saboteurs.” Frost walked around the platform. His men spread out around him. Ostensibly they were looking for the others; he’d already briefed them to give warning should one of the repair robots show undue interest in Hugh’s work.
“Rawn, this is Colonel Frost.”
“Sir?”
“How’s it coming?” Frost tried to scratch a spot on his back through the suit. He tried not to think how long it h
ad been since he’d showered. It would all be over soon, now.
“Nearly done here, sir.”
“Excellent,” Frost grimaced. For the first time, he wondered if all this had been worth it. He’d lost his ship and nearly three quarters of his men. And he didn’t want to think about the repercussions of his current actions.
“Colonel Frost, do you need further motivation to continue your search?” The multi-tonal voice of Fenris spoke over the radio.
Frost grimaced, “No. We’re just making sure they didn’t tamper with the reactors. Once we’re certain they’re fine, we’ll continue to search for them.”
“Good. It would be unfortunate for your wounded to die unnecessarily.”
Frost shook his head and slammed his fist down on a section of pipe. “Get off this channel, machine. I need to coordinate my men.”
“Of course.”
***
“So, what do we do?” Stasia asked.
“Uh, shouldn’t we head for the hangar?” Swaim asked. “I mean, uh, if they’re going to blow the ship…”
“I’m not going to leave my brother to die,” Mel said. She clenched her fists, suddenly afraid that the others would disagree. She wished she could see her companion’s faces. The opaque radiation shielding active on the helmets made them faceless. She couldn’t guess at their responses.
“We aren’t sure that’s what they’re doing,” Brian said. “Moreover, we can’t be sure they’ll succeed.”
“Their plan has to be to set a timer,” Bob said. He craned his head around the door frame again. “It looks like they’re at the reactors now. One group at each. Fair bet that they’ll set them to overload, then run for the bomber.”
“So…” She closed her eyes. “How about we get in a position to block them. Tell them to lay down their weapons. Then, once we get them tied up, we all go to the bomber drone.”
“That sounds awful optimistic,” Bob said. “Knowing Frost, he won’t go down without a fight.”
She wished she could disagree with that sentiment.
“So we take him out first,” Marcus said. He moved up to stand next to her. She felt suddenly grateful for his support. “Shoot him, the others will be leaderless, and with a countdown, they’ll probably give up.”
“And I get them all when we get picked up by the Guard?” Roush asked.
“I’m still considering putting a bullet in your head,” Bob said. “You’ve given us no reason to trust you. For all we know, as soon as we step off this ship, we’re headed for an execution alongside them.”
Roush didn’t answer right away. Finally, he spoke, his voice subdued: “In my front left vest pocket under my armor is a data chip. Have Swaim or your hacker take it out.”
Brian drew his pistol and leveled it at Roush’s back. He nodded at Stasia, “Go ahead.”
Stasia stepped forward and fished inside Roush’s body armor. A moment later, she pulled out a small chip. She put it into her datapad and accessed the information in only a moment.
“Is bank accounts?” She sounded puzzled.
“It’s all the information on the GFN bank accounts in this sector. I might have missed a couple. It doesn’t matter, not with all the information I have on these. There’s over two hundred and fifty million dollars in those accounts. All the account numbers, all the passwords, everything is on there.” Roush sounded slightly disappointed in himself. “It doesn’t matter if you shot me in front of a judge. If you turned that over to Guard Intelligence they’d pardon you for anything.”
“You’re giving us this so we trust you?” Bob asked.
“That’s my bargaining chip,” Roush said. “I get that to my superiors, and they’ll consider this operation a success no matter what happens at Vagyr. Without that money, half of GFN’s operations in this military sector will collapse.”
“What’s to stop us from taking the money ourselves?” Mel asked.
Marcus dropped his hand on her shoulder and gave her a squeeze, “Definitely not a good idea. We’d have Guard Free Now hunting us for it and Guard Intelligence would want our heads.” He shook his head, “Pretty clever, Roush. Giving us this, we have to trust you.”
“That’s the idea,” Roush said. “Of course if we don’t get off this ship alive, it doesn’t matter one bit.” Mel realized he sounded almost cheerful at the prospect.
***
“Colonel Frost, everything here is ready to go,” Rawn said. His voice sounded nervous even through the radio.
Frost smiled grimly. When it came down to it, this made him nervous too.
He glanced at his men, “Keep an eye on those repair ‘bots. And don’t get tunnel vision. Start pulling back to the ladders.” He put his words to action and walked briskly towards the ladder he’d come down.
Once there, he waited. He didn’t have to wait long. His men took up security positions at the base of the ladders. From here, they’d be able to move quickly, he knew.
“All right Rawn, go ahead and do it.”
Almost on cue, Fenris spoke, “Colonel Frost, what exactly is—”
Four remote detonators, set into two separate blocks of plastic explosives, detonated simultaneously. Those explosives had been wrapped around two specific power feeds which led off the main power bus bars for the reactors.
In that instant, Frost cut power to the AI. The backup antimatter plant fed through the reactor bus; when the power was cut the AI died.
He smiled with great satisfaction. He hoped the AI had time enough to realize he’d killed it before power died.
“Anderson, this is Colonel Frost, what’s your status?”
A second later, he heard a response, “Colonel, we’re all right here. Computer didn’t vent us to space, anyway.”
“All right. I’ll send Smith’s team up there to retrieve you and your men in a moment. Frost out.”
He gave a slight sigh of relief. He scratched his jaw. With the AI out of the picture, they’d have to manually control the ship from the auxiliary bridge.
“Sir, I have movement above us,” Rawn said.
“What?” Frost looked up, puzzled. With the AI down, the repair and security robots should have inactivated.
“Contact, enemy contact!” Someone shouted. Frost ducked.
***
“Damn, I can’t get a shot on him,” Bob growled. “He took cover.”
“Do we know what those two explosions were?” Mel asked. They’d moved into position above the terrorists, and apparently someone had seen them. Worse, she realized, the terrorists still had a clear run to the hangar and their converted bomber drone.
“I cannot tell,” Stasia said, “Something is odd with the system.”
Mel flipped her suit radio over to a general broadcast. She hoped one of them down there would listen, “Surrender, or we’ll open fire.”
“Mel?” she heard the startled voice of her brother. “Mel, what the hell are you doing?”
She rolled her eyes in exasperation, “We guessed your plan to overload the reactors,” Mel said. “So surrender and we can all get off this ship.”
She heard laughter, a moment later she heard Frost speak. The humor in his voice sent a spike of rage through her, “Really, quite astute of you. Actually, we just shut down the AI. Also, unless things have drastically changed, we outnumber you.”
Mel felt her face flush. She heard Bob on their private net, “Well that didn’t go as expected…”
“I’ll be generous. If you push Roush out where we can see him, and you throw your weapons down here, I won’t execute all of you,” Frost said.
“Gee, let me see…” Mel said. “You know, generous as that offer is, I gotta pass.”
Frost chuckled again, “You seem to think I would mind fighting you. Really, you’re mistaken if you think I’ll show a hint of mercy if you don’t do as I say, now.”
“Watch the left side,” Brian said, his voice sharp. “Two of them are trying to get a better angle.” She looked in that direction, co
uld barely see the dim shape of one of the men. This didn’t look good.
“You don’t have unlimited personnel,” Mel said. “You’ve lost a lot of your men. No one else needs to die.”
“Mel, just stop trying to be a hero, okay?” Rawn said. The exasperation in his voice cut sharper than any knife.
She clenched her fists and fought down an urge to scream in exasperation. Why couldn’t they see this didn’t have to end in a firefight?
Frost spoke, “I’ve already won, girl. Someone with brains please tell her that with the AI down, this ship will be destroyed on entry to the system without someone in control of it.”
“What about the backup, mainframe then?” Mel asked. “Did you plan for that?”
“Backup mainframe?” Rawn said. She heard the surprise in his voice.
Mel smirked, wishing she could see the shock on Frost’s face. “You didn’t see it on the plans? We’ve probably only got a couple hours before the AI comes back online. So you’ve only got so long before—”
“Enough,” Frost said. “True or not, I won’t waste any more time with this farce. This is your last chance. Send Roush out and throw down your weapons, or I swear I will see you all dead.”
CHAPTER XVI
Time: 1300 Zulu, 17 June 291 G.D.
Location: Fenris, Twenty hours from Vagyr
“This is Colonel Frost. Take them down.”
The first shots rang out. Frost and his group rose, opening up with suppressive fire while Smith and his team started up the ladder on their side.
They had the advantage, Frost knew, as long as they could keep the enemy suppressed, unable to return fire for fear of being hit themselves. If they couldn’t return fire, Smith and his team would flank them.
And in that crossfire, they would die.
Frost smiled, oddly grateful for an enemy he could physically kill. Destroying the AI hadn’t given him nearly enough satisfaction.
***
“They’ve got us pinned down, we need to pull back!” Marcus shouted. Mel pushed her arm up and fired blindly with her pistol. It had no effect.