Repel Boarders

by Dean Henegar

  The point of research he had tied up for level 3 drones was left where it was; he didn’t want to lose the progress he had made so far. For some reason, Quint’s corpse hadn’t unlocked the dwarf template for him. Perhaps he needed multiple samples for some of the advanced humanoids before unlocking them. For that matter, it appeared that scrapping an entire ship didn’t unlock all that ship’s systems, only a few. Why and how certain systems were unlocked and others weren’t was a mystery he wasn’t able to solve yet.

  With research taken care of and underway, Slater thought about his derelict’s setup. He had plenty of salvage to expand, but core power was once again going to become his choke point. With only ten extra power unlocked at level 6, he might have to make some cuts to the MOBS in existing rooms if he wanted to populate more than one or two new compartments. He decided to go ahead and finish building out the Franklin while he had the resources and time to do so. Seven more compartments would complete his initial plan of having two rows of ten compartments for his derelict. He would fine-tune the shape of the compartments when he loaded them with MOBS and traps later. He almost forgot to warn the humans about what was going on, checking on their positions before he started the upgrade.

  All the humans except for Sergeant Gonzales were inside the two compartments he had set up for them. It would take a bit of time for his drones to build out the new spaces and he didn’t want to trap Gonzales on the wrong side of the buildout. He found the sergeant in the rat-keeper’s room, making sure to contact only him and not disturb the others.

  “Sergeant Gonzales, I’m going to be expanding the derelict by adding some new compartments. Unless you want to stay out here for several hours, I suggest you head back to your quarters or the recreation area,” Slater advised.

  “Roger that, sir. I was about to head back for some chow anyway. Thanks for the warning,” Gonzales replied and then hustled back to what Slater was now thinking of as the “human section” of his derelict.

  While Gonzales made his way back to the human areas, Slater queued up production of the new compartments, starting with one connecting to the current bridge area. He would keep the human areas and his core room at the end of the derelict. With everyone out of the way, his drones and nanobots got to work on the vessel while Slater jumped into the testing lab to play mad scientist for a bit. With ten core power available to work with, he made five kobolds armed with laser rifles and five armed with his newest firearms for an initial test. After setting up the testing compartment to look like an Old West street, he had the kobolds ready themselves for a showdown.

  The laser rifles didn’t need any ammo packs, but the new weapons would require some way for the kobolds wielding them to store ammo. He crafted a bandoleer that would hold several cartridges and go over a kobold’s shoulder. The overall effect made the kobolds look like reptilian banditos, which he supposed fit this experiment and the testing compartment’s current western theme. The ammunition had a small initial outlay of salvage—one salvage for fifty rounds—and most of that would be recovered when his drones scoured the battlefield for salvage after a fight. Thankfully, minor design revisions like the bandoleers didn’t require him to stop progress on whatever research the engineering node was engaged in.

  “Ready, draw!” Slater ordered, getting into the spirit of things. The kobolds stood thirty feet apart and blazed away at each other. The first volley dropped most of the participants. This duel idea wasn’t perhaps the best testing method since his MOBS were so close together and could hardly miss at that range. He had the existing participants scrapped and changed out the testing ground to resemble a shooting range. Crafting ten kobolds with lasers, he had them fire at targets while he timed the recharge delay on their weapons and measured their accuracy. There was some variance, but the average was around nine seconds for the weapons to recharge after a shot.

  He scrapped the lasers and printed up rifles for the ten kobolds, complete with ammo and a bandoleer for each. The kobolds banged away with the rifles; their rate of fire was much higher than the lasers at a round every six to seven seconds. Despite their primitive design, the rifles were a better weapon for the time being. The downside was a slightly reduced accuracy over the laser, a difference that would be negligible at the engagement ranges typically found on the ship. Another disadvantage was the smoke produced by the rifle. His level 1 ammo was not of the smokeless powder variety. A prolonged engagement would have the potential to fill the compartment with smoke. His nanobots would, of course, break down the smoke, but would they be able to keep up with several rifles firing at the maximum rate?

  He made one tweak that improved the rate of fire for his rifle-armed kobolds to five seconds, down from the six to seven seconds they could currently achieve. By replacing the bandoleer with a simple ammo pouch, the kobolds were able to reload a bit faster by not having to pluck each round from the loop holding it. So much for bandito kobolds. Slater also printed up some of the pistol versions to test. They were bulky and unwieldy for the small kobolds to use, the heavy rifle cartridge causing a lot of kick in the smaller pistol—though Slater considered it a benefit that both versions used the same ammunition.

  The final loadout for his kobolds would be a rifle and an ammo pouch that held fifty rounds. That would give his MOBS a little over four minutes of continuous fire, much longer than most engagements he expected them to be involved in. Still, Slater didn’t want to lose a battle due to running out of ammo, so he had the drones print up an ammo crate with an extra five hundred rounds for each compartment a kobold with a rifle was to be stationed in.

  Biotech implants had leveled up a while back, and Slater hadn’t had time to mess with the level 2 versions yet. Placing his imaginary Doctor Frankenstein hat on his head, Slater got to work. His first attempt was—of course—for his much-anticipated laser rats. The experiment was still too far beyond his abilities and he was unable to even begin melding the two. Another experiment that he called the blade-storm rats also failed. His idea was to have the rat charge forward and jump on an enemy, whereupon the blades held along its skeletal system would shoot forth to impale the victim. The results were . . . gory and ineffective.

  Looking at it from a fresh perspective, he considered the rats’ strengths and weaknesses. They were agile and fast, and with the natural weapons upgrade, they could be deadly to an unarmored opponent. Their downside was their fragility and the inability for them to make a quick kill. Until he researched further armor upgrades or perhaps dove deeper into natural weapons, there was nothing to be done for their durability. As far as additional offensive power, he spent a moment looking over the rats. They had good biting weapons, modestly effective claws, and a body that couldn’t be modified to hold a weapon yet, which left . . . the tail.

  Slater opened the rat diagram, adding muscle structure to the tail and a steel spike on the end of it. It took trial and error to find the right combination of muscle structure and connective tissue before he got it to work. He blended neural pathways from the tail to the mind, allowing the rats to have increased fine motor control over their newly enhanced appendage. The first tests were okay but not great. The weight of the spike at the end of the tail slowed it down and limited its penetrating power. After a bit more tweaking, he thought he had found the right formula.

  Slater printed up a single kobold and a pair of rats with the new enhancements. The kobold had no weapons other than his arm blade. The experiment would be balanced; a single kobold cost the same as a pair of rats, as far as core power consumption was concerned. The rats approached the kobold, tails waving over their heads like a scorpion. There was no steel spike at the end, and as far as the kobold was concerned, they were just normal bilge rat tails.

  The rats leaped at their prey, tails lashing forward. The kobold thrust out at the nearest rat, impaling it with his wrist blade before the rat could connect. The second rat hit the kobold, its teeth and claws latching onto the MOBS’s chest. As the kobold swept his blade down toward
the rat digging into him, the tail lashed forward. The tail struck the kobold’s chest and the steel spike shot forth, penetrating a good six inches and killing the kobold even as his blade swept down to take out the rat.

  It worked! Keeping the weight of the steel farther inside the tail and creating the mechanism that shot out the spike had allowed the rat greater control over its appendage. A few more adjustments and the spike shot forth even faster. His bilge rats now had a new weapon that only cost one salvage per rat. Slater ordered his drones to begin upgrading all the bilge rats while he considered what to work on next.

  “Noooo!”

  Boom . . .

  Boom . . .

  Boom . . .

  One of the humans was screaming and Slater heard gunfire in the human mess hall. He moved his view over just in time to see Private Long pointing his weapon at one of Slater’s drones. The drone had been blown to pieces by the gunfire, a panicky Long scanning for other targets. When a second drone entered the room, he lit it up with more rounds from his weapon.

  “Private, what is going on in here?” Lieutenant Camden yelled as he burst into the mess hall from the sleeping quarters. Private Harris was also up and about, scanning for targets. Sergeant Gonzales walked up behind Long—he was extremely stealthy for such a large man—and pulled Long’s weapon from his grasp.

  “Sorry, sir, but the drones just went crazy and started slicing up Mr. Bitey. Look at his poor tail,” Private Long said, pointing toward the rat’s flayed-open appendage. For his part, Mr. Bitey was standing there, as calm as he could be. Slater knew the MOBS felt no pain during their upgrade process, but the visual of what was happening must have been a shock to Long.

  “Lieutenant, I believe I can explain,” Slater said. “I had just finished an upgrade to my bilge rat MOBS and have ordered my drones to complete the upgrade on all the existing units. I should have warned you, given Private Long’s attachment to his . . . friend. I can assure you that my drones are in no way harming Mr. Bitey and in fact will make him a better fighter with his new upgrade.”

  Long visibly calmed and Gonzales released him after slapping the private in the side of the head. “I’m sorry about this, Slater. Long didn’t mean any harm and I suppose he was just trying to protect his pet,” the lieutenant replied, giving Private Long the stink eye.

  Slater figured that the private would be the new favorite pick for whatever crap detail came up. “No apology needed, Lieutenant. Just a misunderstanding. If you can keep from shooting them, Private Long, I’d like my drones to complete the upgrade for Mr. Bitey and recover the salvage from the destroyed units.”

  Long mumbled out an apology and stepped away from the bilge rat he had adopted as his pet. A trio of drones came out. Two gathered the salvage from their destroyed kin while the third completed the upgrade, much to the horror of Private Long.

  “Absolutely fascinating,” Doctor Cheng said as she watched the drone finish the upgrade on Mr. Bitey. “How often are you able to upgrade your MOBS, Captain Slater?”

  “I have to research the upgrades in my core, and sometimes I am able to test the results and improve upon them with a bit of trial and error,” Slater replied.

  “Yes, but where do you perform the experiments, and can I watch the next time you conduct one?” the doctor asked.

  “There’s a sealed-off chamber below my core room. I can set up a feed for you the next time I try something. As a matter of fact, I would love to get your input with my next attempts. A bit of a warning, though: the experiments often involve printing up MOBS to fight each other in order to gauge the effectiveness of an upgrade,” Slater advised.

  “I don’t mind a little gore. I realize these MOBS are constructs and not sentient beings,” Cheng said.

  “Dude! Did you hear that, Long? Slater’s got like a Thunderdome thing set up beneath his core. Uh, Slater, can Long and I watch next time, too? We can make bets on which of the MOBS will win,” Private Harris said excitedly.

  “Not a problem. I’ll share the feed with anyone that wants to watch next time as long as the lieutenant approves,” Slater advised.

  Lieutenant Camden nodded in agreement as the sergeant led the two privates off to perform maintenance on their gear. Slater excused himself and went back to planning out what to do with the new compartments. As he shifted his focus, he could hear Long and Harris chatting away.

  “Check out Mr. Bitey’s new upgrade, Harris. His tail has a metal scorpion stinger thingy in it now,” Long said.

  “That’s wicked. I bet he could totally win Slater’s Thunderdome Challenge—let’s call it the Slaterdome. Two MOBS enter, one MOBS leaves . . .”

  — 21 —

  Slater decided to spend some time reviewing his existing setup as well as build out all the new compartments. He left one empty compartment between the human barracks and his core room, intending to use it as a med bay for his passengers once he got around to researching it. He added a second empty compartment behind the med bay and earmarked that for the humans to use as they saw fit. He wanted his guests to be comfortable and encourage new visitors once the fleet arrived to haul him back to Earth. Slater felt homesick as he thought of the blue-green planet he was from. Visiting it in his current state wouldn’t feel the same, but it was home.

  The boarding hatch compartment Slater left the same, save for removing a pair of the rats in their hidden compartments. Dropping the total MOBS in the compartment by one pair freed up some much-needed core power for one of the new compartments he was planning on building. To compensate for the loss of the rats, he placed a pit trap near the compartment’s exit. That and the two tripwire traps he had already installed would remain inactive until an intruder proved hostile. If any boarders wanted to kill his core, they would have to run the whole gauntlet. If they wanted to just explore the derelict, Slater could dial things back a bit.

  The next compartment was the garbage-filled room. Here, he decided to drop down to two pairs of rats along with the single pit trap in the middle of the room. Meant as an easy first encounter for regular explorers, the compartment wasn’t that much of a threat. After the garbage compartment, he had the cargo hallway. This hall currently held four kobolds and two pairs of rats. He decided to reduce the MOBS in here as well, bolstering their numbers with traps since he had much more salvage than power for the time being. The benefit of the traps was that he could easily scrap them if he needed more salvage later. He went down to two kobolds and the two pairs of rats, adding tripwire traps near each hatchway.

  After the cargo hall, Slater decided to place one of his new compartments. He wanted to do something fun and try out the MOBS he hadn’t used yet. The compartment was set up like a laboratory. Three operating tables were placed in the room, and it was decorated with surgical lights, instruments, and tables lined with bubbling concoctions, everything a mad scientist needed to do his work. On each of the three operating tables, he printed up a defiler. They weren’t as effective as his kobold warriors, but Slater wanted the next pair of rooms to put any explorers on edge. For his mad scientist, he printed up a taskmaster, who should be able to command the defilers somewhat effectively in a fight. The taskmaster was decked out in surgeons garb, complete with bloodstains. He armed him with one of the new pistols, concealing it beneath his doctor’s gown. The slightly larger size of the taskmaster should allow him to fire the weapon, and it would be a good test of its effectiveness.

  The next compartment was set up to look like holding cells for the doctor’s failed experiments. Four unlocked cages were placed in the room, and a fifth cage with the door torn off was placed near the exit. Slater printed up five defilers, noting that they were smaller than his kobolds but had the same deadly claws as the ones that the admiral had sent over. Their teeth were longer than a normal kobold’s teeth but were not the gnarly mess of fangs the admiral’s defilers had sported. He would spend a research point on them later to see if there was any change. At level 0, the upgrade to level 1 should be quick enough
to justify tying up a research slot on it.

  Four of the defilers he ordered into the cages. The fifth he had special plans for. He took the best-looking of the lot and upgraded it to the boss MOBS version—an eviscerator. Slater hadn’t seen the actual eviscerator on the admiral’s derelict and was curious what it would turn into. The creature grew a head taller than a normal defiler and the claws on its hands elongated. Bony protrusions began to emerge from its joints, leaving small spikes on its knees and elbows. The teeth were long and sharp, ready to rend a foe to pieces. As far as placement went, Slater put the new boss creature near the destroyed cage, where it stood ready to defend its lair. His eviscerator boss took up the same five core power as his kobold captain, though it would be much less powerful until upgraded to a similar level. While it didn’t cost him any salvage, the eviscerator did take twenty-five biomass to craft.

  After his lab and failed-experiment room, Slater placed the trap-filled hallway. It was a good transition point to the main kobold-inhabited portions of his derelict. He decided to strip the hall of the six rats in hidden compartments, wanting to keep the room with just its other three traps for the time being. The defenses in the hall now comprised a pair of tripwire traps and a pit trap in between, just enough to slow down and injure explorers before they hit the mess hall. If he ended up with a surplus of core energy at a later date, he would see about reinforcing the compartment with some MOBS.

  After making the changes to the trap-filled hallway, he was notified that his drone, firearms, and ammunition research was complete. The drones in his derelict all stopped and began to glow as the nanobots completed the upgrade for them. When they were finished, the drones scurried about much faster and had even more strange tools protruding from their bodies. Slater had the drones break down and rebuild the eviscerator, wanting to check out the upgrade’s effectiveness. Both the breakdown and the rebuild happened around fifteen percent faster than before, a nice improvement considering it affected all twenty-five of his drones.