by G Aliaksei C
“What, like a Gustav?” Two confused stares were my reward for witty but incorrect historical references.
“That’s not how they get you, though!” Inna teleported right onto the moving vehicle, softly landing on the front armor. All but the helmet of her armor was phased in, making it easier for her to stay still on the rocking tank. “They set up anti-air systems, surround the target, and wage a war of attrition until the target falls to starvation or runs out of supplies. Deliveries from space are shot down, and ground supplies can rarely break the blockade.”
“And we don’t have a Gate to supply us from the inside.”
My machine, now covered in heavily armed villages and escorted by Jims, came to a stop at the fortress gates. Jims rushed up, scaling the wall and taking position between the smaller turrets. Four of the nearest RAM-Ds locked into position. One of the massive artillery guns remained on the opposite side of the base, covering the ‘flank’.
I ran up the stairs next to the gateway. The ten-meter climb put me on the top of the wall, and I squatted behind the merlon, looking at the horizon through a pair of binoculars. I scanned the gray ridge across the stretch of valley, struggling to spot anything between the scattered rocks and ridges. Inna scooted up to me, looking curiously downrange, her cybernetic red eyes seeing more than my binoculars could ever hope to show me.
“You’re not going to see them. The main force is behind the hills and mountains. They aren’t stupid enough to get in the direct line of fire of your RAM-Ds, and they have the deflectors and point defense to guard against arcing artillery.”
“Which we don’t even have.” I set the binoculars down in annoyance. “Deflectors? I thought Gems didn’t work in their hands.”
“Doesn’t stop them from hiring non-Raider help.” I nodded, remembering my first encounter with these people. One of them held a shield over the lot, effectively covering the gunners from return fire.
Delaying my next question in a rude yet cinematic way, the blue glass-like dome over my fortress groaned and strained with power. Part of the dome went solid black, shielding the sun and covering the base in darkness. I looked around, trying to ignore the ringing in my ears, and saw a shockwave moving outward, away from the Comfort Dome.
The nanites in my ears quickly repaired the damage, allowing me to hear Inna once more.
“Artillery!”
“Bastards!” I refused to consider what the hit would have done to an unshielded base, once more mentally thanking Inna for her Comfort Dome.
“Don’t worry, the dome should hold.”
“Are we going out to kill them?” I filtered the eager tone out of my voice.
“We could,” considered Inna. “But that would not stop them. They would set up dozens of long-range anti-air cannons and missile batteries. Then they would shoot down any and all incoming supplies, effectively taking away our physical access to the outside world. For every base we destroy, two more will be put up. We would starve before they ran out of ammo, no matter how much we counterattacked.”
It was hard to think, I noted. I did not like the sensation and focused on it, trying to find the source of the mental fog. My home is being sieged? Annoying, but we should be able to handle this. Tired? No, I had plenty of rest. The enemy?
I stopped rubbing my forehead, glaring at the horizon with golden-tinted eyes. Far away, atop a hill, I saw the still form of a lone jeep-like transport.
“Drake, you know you make it really, really clear when you are about to murder something, right? Can’t you suppress that… glow?”
“Inna.” The front armor of her faceplate turned towards me. “I need it to seem like you are in charge, like this is your base.” She did not argue with the idea. “Take Jim, and go meet them.”
The two dashed off the wall, racing for the war machine. In a minute the tank hummed out of the gateway and forcefield, heading away from the base.
I could barely contain my rage. This enemy, one that acted so much like the forces I was programmed to annihilate, dared to fire upon my home. Pressing the binoculars into my face I watched the gunpoint negotiations unfold.
A golden silhouette highlighted Inna’s invisible shape as she dashed behind the jeep. The Lady of War remained unnoticed as she flanked the enemy while Jim began to talk. He chose not to transmit the entire conversation, which lasted several minutes, until they came to some sort of agreement. Another Jim stepped up next to me on the walls.
“They don’t want us serving as a waypoint for anti-Raider operations. They also want to use our Mailing Driver. In return, they will not siege or interfere with us, and pay for mailing services.”
A spark of calm allowed me to look the problem and proposition over. I turned to one of the villagers. “Is the deal solid?”
“I would not know, Mr. Frost. Our town had a Gate, a siege like this was not a threat to us.”
I looked back at Jim. “Then tell them the deal starts now. They have an hour to vacate the ten kilometers around my fortress, or I will begin to widen the valley by leveling these void damned mountains.”
This Jim nodded and stepped back, leaving me to watch the conversation from the walls.
At some point I saw Inna uncloak atop the jeep, startling the two armored figures negotiating with Jim. The supposed power move seemed to work and my party soon returned to the tank, making their way home. I frowned, noticing that one of the enemies joined them atop my machine.
Returning the binoculars to one of the other observers on the walls, I stepped to the other side of the wall to look at the new arrival. Jim and Inna flanked an armored woman with a sheathed longsword in one hand and a suitcase in the other.
“If she so much as sneezes in a suspicious way,” I whispered to Jim, “kill her where she stands.”
The woman was tall, slender, and beautiful like every other Human I had seen in this utopian future. Her pale skin stood out in the bright sunlight. As she passed, I noted the smooth grace competing with Inna’s in precision, a detail I had come to associate with great age.
The earlier rage, dulled for a time by curiosity, reignited. I worked not to scowl as my sight ignited with gold once more.
“A beautiful base you have here.” The musical voice rang in my Coefficient-enhanced ears. “I would love to have it.”
“And I would love to have your head on a pike, Xandra.” Inna’s filtered voice was loud and clear as well.
“Anything for an old friend, my dear Kenet.” The despising laughter in the ambassador’s voice did well to spin up my anger to its peak.
Inna’s faceplate turned up to look at me where I stood, glaring down from the walls with two Jims.
Xandra’s head turned smoothly to track the look, and her smug smile flashed into nonexistence when her eyes met mine. I glared back down, motionless, arms crossed on my chest. My gold reflected in her wide eyes.
Corporate, she mouthed the curse.
Scum, I thought. She would see the words well enough.
The raider turned back, and quickly followed Inna away.
A large list was forming in my head. There were a lot of things I would need to buy to ensure this sort of situation always ended on my terms. Arcing artillery, for example.
It took me a minute to cool my boiling blood. Eventually I headed back to my bunker. My unreasonable anger slowly subsided, the thought of being threatened into something replaced by consideration of Inna’s armor. It was the first time I had seen the full set appear and disappear, phase in and out, and the application of the technology began to sprout ideas in my mind. The massive debt I had managed to accumulate so far slowly shifted to the back of my mind.
Rarus called me the next day. I was eagerly awaiting word from her, but had not expected the Inson to bother with more than a message.
“Greetings Rarus. Is all well?”
“Greetings, Drake Frost. I am alone, in a secured compartment.”
“Alright?” The serious-sounding insectoid concerned me.
&n
bsp; “Are you the Technomancer listed as the creator of these Firebolters?”
“Yes, though I would like you to keep that to yourself.”
“Thus is the source of my comment regarding privacy. I sold the bracelets to members of two groups that we cooperated an assault with yesterday. The assault was a success, and your items have gained certain, minor, smashing popularity as weapons of last hope in battle. I have requests for further shipments. There is already a notable impact on local market values - people are saving up to buy Firebolters. Will there be more?”
“Yes, I plan on making more with the profits. How much did you sell them for?”
I quickly checked my credit balance. Two million credits decorated my Menu’s corner. Success!
“100,000 each. I sent my share of the sales too, to help with the size of the next shipment. Please send it soon, before the potential customers lose interest.”
“I’m on it Rarus, thank you! They will arrive in the next few days.”
“Thank you Drake. I will be awaiting.”
With my bank account significantly boosted I ordered a shipment of materials and parts to be airdropped into the base with a rush delivery. The same evening crates of materials began to land in the expanded airbase. Transport carts quickly collected the packages, taking the fresh road to my bunker. The service elevator found its use, lowering crate after crate underground into my labs and workshops. Soon the different fabricators were humming with effort, producing module after module.
Sleep took a backstage as I worked through the night, assembling the modules into working bracelets. The first hundred bracelets were shipped out in the morning, the mailing cannon thumping as the shell disappeared into the sky. After a breakfast break I returned to work, assembling a hundred more from the stacking piles of parts before sending them to Rarus and passing out.
Ford would have laughed at my suffering.
Morning greeted me with a credit balance of over eight million and a call from Rarus. Apparently she chose to keep her cut this time.
“I have taken it upon myself to distribute the goods myself until now, but I shall now forward them to dealers for a section of my cut, for both of our safeties. There is growing interest in your produce, Drake. Locals are demanding information on their source.”
“Keep it up. Do we need to worry about the shipments being backtracked to me?”
She thought, the small insectoid head shifting from side to side in consideration. I read up on the Inson species, and knew their brains were within their torso, at the center of mass, the small head only serving as a turret for sensory organs. “We need to start shipping the packages to different collection points when they first leave… wherever you are. That way the mailing source can’t be backtracked to you so easily.”
“On the list of things I should have thought up earlier… If anything happens to you and you need to hide, you can find me where we first met.” The insectoid head tilted to the side, imitating a surprised-confused expression, but kept quiet. “Are you satisfied with the current deal we have?”
“I am. This deal is making me rich and famous. My status in the Inson society has already risen to a point where mates are reaching out to me with interest. I am far from the strongest of fighters, yet already three of my kind made contact!” I frowned. I was not familiar with the complexities of Inson society. Rarus, clearly capable of reading Human expression, explained. “There are few of us, and everyone seeks to find the most capable mate to ensure the good heritage for our children.”
I couldn’t help my curiosity. “Anyone to your liking?”
If the insectoid’s armored shell could blush, it probably would now. “Not really. I think that, soon, higher ranked candidates will make contact.”
“Just be careful not to pick a greedy one, or one interested to find the source of your wealth.”
“You speak like a true Corporate, Drake. My species is not greedy, not in your sense. We would never lie to one-another. There are too few of us for that.”
That hit too close to home, but I waved the memories away.
“This package will be the last for a day or two. I need to make some changes to the production process.”
“Understood, Drake. Thank you for your invitation. Goodbye.”
My next order of import was to make Ford proud. A series of fabricators, converters and assemblers landed in a container within the day. Tired of imitating an assembly line all by my lonesome, I intended to create an automatic factory for the bracelets. The gentle equipment took longer to deliver, and the crates proved too unwieldy to manage alone.
Barging into the cafe I pointed at eight random startled customers.
“…and you, with me, I need help.” Without protest the men and women dropped their food and drinks. “Finally!” Someone commented. Xandra, who was sitting in the corner of the cafe, wiped the look of concern off her face and replaced it with curiosity.
“Uh, Mr. Frost? Will we need weapons?” The villager emphasized his question by raising a massive gun from under the table.
I frowned at him. “Where do you think we live?”
“Right. Of course.” The man raised a second gun, handing both on his shoulders.
The named volunteers moved with the maddening grace of older beings, walking with purpose after me. Climbing the tank I had them man transport carts as the equipment was moved from the airbase out, across the base, and to an isolated part of Vazanklav’s vast and empty territory.
Several foam-concrete bots quickly constructed a small hangar around us as we filled the space with the boxes. Modular equipment kits quickly came together within, forming several conveyors lined with fabricators. Between sleep and combat we poured our time into the project like it was the most important task of our lives. The mood swept me up, the familiar euphoria of work fueling me through the days.
Two days of collective work, sweat and frustration yielded a fully automatic factory, which began to immediately disgorge complete bracelets. Testing proved their functionality, and the production began in earnest.
It was nice to see my volunteers were as excited about the success as me. They applauded and cheered as the factory groaned to life.
Twenty days passed like that, thousands of bracelets being sent off to different cities all over the Waste Ring. Rarus set up an organized chain of ever-changing distributors who kept both me and her somewhat isolated from the unfolding economics of the situation. I set up a second assembly chain, doubling production to just over three hundred a day. I also set up a separate credit wallet, forwarding all transactions from Rarus there. With around nine million credits coming in every day, I was able to finally start paying off debts. That still left me with a million credits a day to put in a savings fund.
Soon Rarus began forwarding my shipments to some proper, larger weapon store chains. This solved the instability of the Firebolter’s value, and provided an easier method of distribution.
Another five days later Rarus disappeared. For four days shipments kept being sent out, and credits kept flowing back in, but from ever-changing banks and accounts rather than from Rarus herself. Calls and messages to her found no endpoint, left to float over the Ring network in search of their destination.
I had no way of knowing where she went, or how she was doing, and I could do little more than keep waiting for word from my friend.
1 : Life on the Waste Ring
Day 32
“AHHHHHHH!”
“What the fuck!”
The head splitting scream launched me out of my bed. I tried to clasp my hands over my ears, only to realize the screaming was in my head. The barrel of the pistol I drew from under my pillow searched for a target, finding none. Unable to think through the noise I rushed out of my bunker, where, finally, the noise ceased.
“JIM!”
“Good morning Mr. Frost…”
“There’s something screaming in my bunker!”
“…Inna is on her way.”
By the time the Innkeeper arrived on my tank I had probed out the line where the screaming began, and its area of effect around my house. On the sand I drew out a map of the bunker, and triangulated the center of the issue. Suppressing the headache of the noise I turned to greet my savior.
Inna hopped off the tank a distance away and walked up to me.
“So, screaming grasshopper?” She beamed at me with a laughing smile.
“What?”
“Telepathic, screaming grasshopper.”
“That’s a grasshopper?”
Inna raised a notebook. The solid, weathered cover protected a thick set of discolored pages. On the cover, in neat handwriting, were the words “Anomaly Manual”.
“This is what you open when you encounter something that doesn’t make sense,” said the Lady of War.
I snatched the book, carefully flipping it open.
Wheat infestation.
In case of wheat infestation, look for flowers on the wheat mass. If flowers are not present, carpet-bomb the mass with high-temperature charges. Ensure the scorched area extends at least twenty meters past the edge of the mass. If flowers are present, cover the mass and any infested area with a one-way energy dome. Use masers to increase internal temperature to over four thousand degrees Celsius. Fracture the resulting mass with explosives and repeat the process. Monitor area for residue wheat infestation for at least thirty days.
I carefully closed the book and looked up with blank eyes.
“See,” explained Inna, “when wheat is planted on the Waste Ring, it reaches maturity and then rises into a multi-ton biomass. Overnight. This destroyed several outposts in the initial colonization of the Waste Ring.”
“This is… wheat? The stuff you grow for bread and flour?”
“That, and several alien equivalents. It’s very deadly.”
“So that’s why the sandwiches tasted weird…” The twenty questions in my head reassembled into a comprehensive list, ranked by importance. I picked the one that bothered me the most.
“I never figured something out. This isn’t written in any language I learned.” I waved the notebook. “So how can I read it?”