Galaxy Dog

by Brett Fitzpatrick

  Altia opened her mouth to protest but Shivia cut her off and kept talking.

  "I, however," she continued, "am the most senior member of the Ministry of Science, the government department with access to the most information and most sophisticated analysis of said information. I can assure you that, although it is far from certain that we are journeying to the Ice Tomb of the Drifters, I do have some hope that we might not be completely mistaken about our goal."

  "I see," Altia stuttered.

  "Now. Do you have anything new for me. Anything to further strengthen my suspicions about our objective."

  "There is something," Altia admitted.

  "Excellent," Shivia said, "Though I don't appreciate you making me work for it like this. All right. Out with it."

  "We are quite certain now, assuming this text isn't just a fairy story, that the Drifter System was in contact with the Ice Tomb for some time after the Ice Tomb was established."

  "Okay," Shivia nodded.

  "There is a record of a mutiny among the crew of the spaceship traveling to the Ice Tomb on what we think, though their numbering system is still obscure, was the three-hundredth voyage."

  "A single spaceship?"

  "According to the records, but it could be that the text refers to a fleet, and that is why a singular noun is used."

  "Interesting. Go on."

  "What the mutiny was about is also difficult to interpret, but the text does refer to trials of summary justice, perhaps executions, perhaps marooning, carried out on the three-hundredth journey, the three-hundred and second, and various others, though I am even less sure of when they occurred, contemporaneously or perhaps much later."

  "This is juicy," Shivia said, "You have been busy."

  "It's all in the report," Altia said, "I can send it to you, or you could take a physical copy."

  Altia picked a data chip from a little alcove in her desk and held it up for Shivia to see. Shivia nodded almost imperceptibly and held out a hand to receive the data chip. Altia got up from her desk and crossed the room. When she was in front of Shivia's chair, she proffered the small chunk of plastic. Shivia took the data chip. She was looking in Altia's eyes as she did so.

  "All perfectly fascinating," Shivia said, "But how does this help me?"

  "We can just send one of the spaceships from the convoy to check planets along the way," Altia said.

  "It's already happening," Shivia said.

  "Already?" Altia replied.

  "Yes. I have sent spaceships to thoroughly investigate the surface of the planets along our route. We, however, are going to Phaeton 7."

  "It's not a very evocative name," Altia murmured absentmindedly, "But I suppose I prefer it to Ice Tomb."

  Chapter 7

  ––––––––

  Knave woke up among a scene of destruction. His drones were completely unharmed and had obviously been the agents of all the destruction. They had behaved as the Buzzer had predicted. Knave even wondered if the Buzzer had put the idea in their heads. They had kept firing till their target, the Buzzer itself, was reduced to a weird organic looking metal mess. Also, as the Buzzer had predicted, its delicate language experiments had been blasted to smithereens. There was hardly any trace of the monitors that had once displayed the beautiful and complex signs of the language of the Drifters in ever-changing combinations. The wall behind the monitors had also suffered, with numerous craters scorch marks and collapsed sections. Only one carved sign had been left untouched, the operator sign.

  "Well I hope you're proud of yourselves my hungry wolves, it seems you have blasted this poor Buzzer and his life's work to smithereens."

  The drone on the right beeped noncommittally while the other remained silent.

  "Whatever that flash was," Knave continued, "I don't think he intended it to target me."

  Still no answer.

  “Whatever,” Knave muttered.

  He climbed to his feet and gathered up his weapon.

  “I guess there's no reason to hang around in here,” he said, “Let's get out there and find out what's going on."

  When Knave got outside of the science research structure, back into the driving snow of the moon's atmosphere, followed by his little troupe of drones, it was to discover from a new message scrolling across the interior of his visor that he had been designated a 'rear' unit and was being recalled to the bottom of the mountain. He looked at the coordinates he had been given. It was a featureless stretch of mountainside. Control must have its reasons, he decided and headed off in the direction indicated. His connection with control then promptly dropped out again, then came back, then dropped out. The Buzzer interference was back too, but now, what had seemed to be just strange alien psychological warfare, seemed to sound like the voice of the alien scientist he had just seen killed by his own drones.

  He climbed down the hillside. They were rarely under fire, though they were strafed once or twice by Buzzer atmospheric units. They were approaching the coordinates they had been given when they saw it.

  Up ahead was a huge dropship, twice as big as the type deployed by the Galaxy Dog and carrying enormously more armor. It was more a hollowed out slab of armor with flight systems attached than it was a spaceship. It was dark and there were two gaping holes where a couple of its assault ramps had been deployed. Although only two were open, hinged down to form boarding ramps, there were eight giant doors in the base of the spaceship, each one facing a different direction.

  He checked his tactical map of the theater of operations. It was zoomed in on the dropship he had just been given responsibility for. He and his drones were the only friendly units marked anywhere nearby, apart from a knot of Tarazet units and some hostiles nearer the dropship. There were flashes of light near the giant, beached spaceship, the fighting, though it wasn't heavy.

  Knave refocused his eyes away from the tactical map, back onto the landscape, and looked around again. This time he took a good look at the terrain. He saw that some of the things he had assumed to be rocks in the dim light were in fact the remains of Buzzers and drones. He didn't see any human power armor among the rocks but he assumed there were the carcases of people too, mixed in among the mechanical remains, even if he couldn’t see them. By the time he had looked back at the dropship, the fighting was over. A suit of assault armor reared out of the gloom.

  “You inside,” a voice emanating from the armor yelled at him, “but leave the wolves out here.”

  Knave gratefully complied, climbing the ramp into the belly of the massive assault dropship. The figure was right behind him.

  "There," it said.

  It was pointing to a position at the top of the landing ramp, where he would have some cover and also be able to see out. He went where the figure was pointing. Over the distorted communications he couldn't tell if his new companion was male or female and the armor the person was wearing wasn't giving anything away either. All he could tell from the armor was that this warrior came from a unit with much better equipment than his. The figure turned from observing the view through the doorway to look at Knave.

  "Your job," the figure said, "is to make sure no Buzzers come up that ramp. Understand?"

  Knave nodded. The figure slapped him on the shoulder and ran down the ramp and out onto the broken, icy terrain. Knave watched the figure running off, saw it joined by a drone he didn't recognize, sleeker and more deadly looking than his wolves, with bigger gun ports. Then he and his remaining five drones were alone.

  Completely alone.

  His tactical map showed the action moving away from him, and he started to relax a little bit. He told two of his drones to go dig out the units he had lost during the Buzzer tank ambush. He couldn't abide the thought of leaving two functioning drones under the ice. The navy told everyone that the drones lacked proper AI, and that they should be thought of as expendable equipment. They would take a dim view of him sending two perfectly good drones off into harm's way. Knave shrugged to himself. He didn't care w
hat the navy thought.

  It would be half a day before they returned but they were successful and his drone count went up from five to seven. By that time, Knave was feeling more at home within his new charge. The dropship was nothing like the Galaxy Dog. The Galaxy Dog was designed to drop off mobile units and come pick them up later. There were numerous flight crew and support areas. This dropship was designed for a one-way trip. It was just drone racking, rank upon rank of drone racking. All empty. All the drones and their handlers were out on the ice, climbing the mountain, looking for Buzzers to kill and Buzzer structures to clear.

  Knave spent as much time as he could where he had been told to stand, but even ducked into cover, Knave felt exposed. The door was just huge, big enough for six car-size drones to exit side by side.

  "To hell with this," Knave said to himself.

  He lowered his mass driver, and started looking round for a way to close the huge ramp. He found the controls, and pushed the large, square, yellow button that returned the door to vertical. The door immediately started to lift, very slowly. As soon as it was closed tight he found a smaller access door. One of his drones was standing nearby, outside in the fog, ice and snow. Its torso was sweeping left and right, scanning the surroundings for hostiles.

  "Can you get in through here?" he asked it.

  The drone walked over and stopped in front of the door. Green laser scanners splashed out and swept up and down the door frame. The drone thought for a second, then seemed to come to a decision. It retracted the mass driver in its nose, folded down the weapons pods on its wings, doors closing on missile racks as the pods folded, and hunched its teardrop shaped body down on its huge ostrich legs. It shuffled forward and, with a screeching of metal and some scratched paint, it was through.

  "Great," Knave said, "Tell the others to get in here. I don't see the point of sentries. We know they'll be coming after all. We just don't know when. And close the door after you."

  A second drone was already squeezing inside through the door.

  "Oh," Knave offered his mass driver to the nearest drone, "and hold onto this."

  The drone deployed a manipulator hand on the end of a snake-like arm of metal from a hatch in its belly and took the mass driver. It then stowed the weapon away in a bay that opened on its underside.

  Knave turned away while it was doing this and his eyes searched around for a view port, somewhere high up where he could get a good view of the tactical situation. He saw an area above him that acted as a viewing platform above the drone racks. He could see that it projected outside of the dropship as well. There was a ladder up to it, wide and robust enough to support power armor. Knave climbed the stairs and entered. The space seemed to serve a multitude of roles. It provided oversight of the drone bay, there were windows with a good forward view, and there were admin areas and berths too.

  ***

  Knave slipped out of his armor, sat down and stared out the view port he had found. He could see that the battle was raging.

  "Looks like you're better off in here," Knave said to himself.

  Then he saw two points of light approaching fast. They streaked past the windows of Knave's new perch, while the dropship was rocked by explosions. The shocks were strong enough that they would have thrown him off his feet if he wasn't in an acceleration couch.

  "What the hell?" he yelled.

  "Missiles," came a soothing female voice.

  Knave spun round, the voice had sounded like it was right behind his left shoulder. More Buzzer interference in the communications? It took him a moment to realize that he was still alone, that it wasn't Buzzers. It was the spaceship computer.

  "Missiles?"

  "Impacts registered at access ramp four."

  Knave ran across the control area, from the windows at the front that looked outside to the windows at the back that looked down on the drone bay. There was obvious damage at the access door, but it was still closed and it had held.

  "Return fire," Knave yelled at the ship's computer.

  "My weaponry is offline. Command is sending air superiority units to deal with the threat."

  Knave never found out if the air superiority units took out the attacking craft, or if the enemy had gone on to attack other targets with lighter armor. All he knew was that it didn't come back. And so the battle went on. Fighting ebbed and flowed, coming near and drawing away again. His orders didn't change. His display instructed him to hold the terrain around the dropship. Outside, and comfortably far away, fighting went on and on, and then came nightfall.

  "Ship," he said.

  "Call me Fortress."

  "Fortress?"

  "It's a nickname."

  "Are you full AI."

  "Yep."

  "But you look," Knave said, then paused a second, "You look as if you were designed to be disposable. Your engines don't look like they'll get you back into orbit."

  "I'm an orbital deliverable and recoverable structure. They'll come get me once the fighting is over, and then I'll be dropped into the middle of the next mess."

  "Do they often leave someone here to hang around and keep you company."

  "Yes, usually three or four. These personnel were lost soon after planetfall. You're a replacement."

  "Right," Knave said, "It's just that I wasn't briefed for this. Is there something I'm supposed to be doing. Am I supposed to be out there patrolling."

  "I'll tell you if there's anything to do. Just get some sleep for now."

  Knave tore his eyes away from the battle and forced them closed. The fighting seemed to be higher up the mountain, which he supposed meant that Tarazet forces were gaining ground. He closed his eyes and went to sleep.

  ***

  He didn't know how long he had been sleeping when he was woken by an alarm. It wasn't coming from inside his armor. It was coming from the speakers and screens dotted around the bridge. As soon as his eyes opened the noise and flashing lights stopped. Knave could immediately see that a lot had changed. The fighting was much closer, though still too far away to see any detail. Just glimpses of explosions through the driving snow.

  "Problems?" Knave prompted.

  "There are enemy units within striking range."

  "You want me take the puppies out and deal with them."

  "Puppies?"

  "Wolfhound drones."

  "Yes," the spaceship's calm female voice said, "You and the remaining drones should ensure that they do not enter."

  "That's what the other guy said."

  "You should begin your defense immediately. The enemy units are approaching slowly and their weaponry is still at long range. If they approach much closer, your chances of surviving as you exit the vehicle will be significantly reduced."

  Knave ran down to the bay doors. He held his hands out to the drone with his mass driver, and the drone gave it back to him.

  "Okay, open the door," he yelled.

  The same ramp they had entered by started to slowly hinge downward. Knave climbed it as soon as the gradient was gentle enough, followed by his remaining seven drones.

  "Fire at will," he said.

  The first billows of snow started blowing into the hold and visibility was definitely worse than before. Mass driver rounds were slamming into the ramp now so Knave dived to the snow, rolled to the side and came up firing.

  His drones were rushing forward, a much more inviting target to the Buzzers. The Buzzers concentrated fire on the lead drone, which had its armor torn and strewn around the ramp. Another drone was hit a glancing blow in the leg but kept moving. The last drone out was the drone that had had its nose torn off by its mass driver malfunctioning. It was firing with its blasters, its only weapon system still online.

  Knave saw a very tempting target in his sights. The entire upper portion of a Buzzer as it moved position from one piece of rocky, icy cover to another. Knave pulled the trigger on his mass driver. He felt the weapon judder as rods were chipped off the ammo block and fed into the chamber, then hea
rd the whine as they were accelerated at relativistic speeds towards the enemy. Long lines of lightning-blue ionized atmosphere were drawn through the falling snow, and where they touched turned into destruction. Ice was pummeled apart and thrown around in head-sized chunks, snow billowed in clouds, rock chippings ricocheted, and the Buzzer dived for cover, somehow unharmed by all the mayhem.

  A heavy finger icon appeared in his field of view, warning him that his shooting had been uncontrolled, wild in its aim and wild in the amount of ammo he had expended.

  His drones’ shots were much more accurate and their ammo use much more controlled. He had kept rolling thunder across the landscape to no effect while they were spitting little controlled bursts of fire, and they were finding targets. One Buzzer was struck at the joint between its head and torso, blowing its metal fruit-bowl head off. Another was hit a glancing blow on the shoulder sending it down into cover.

  Soon both sides were in cover and there was a protracted firefight. Knave cursed as he lost another drone. Then he saw rock explode just in front of his faceplate. The mass-driver rod had hit his hiding place with such force that splinters of ice and rock were sent in all directions. Cracks appeared in his face plate, but only, according to suit sensors, in the outer layer. It was cosmetic damage, but if the mass-driver rod had been just a little to the side it would have taken his head clean off.

  Knave rolled away from what was obviously a compromised position. He came to his feet and looked about for some other cover. Instead he saw a Buzzer, just a few steps away. It had a mass driver in each of its lower arms and a wicked looking blade in each of its upper arms.

  Knave muttered another curse as the Buzzer brought one of the mass drivers up to point at him. Knave knew what he shouldn't do. He knew he shouldn’t just stand there and return fire. The creature had two heavy weapons to his one. He knew he shouldn't run away. He would just make a tempting target to get shot in the back. He knew he shouldn't run towards it. That would just bring him in range of the creature's blades. He took a good look at them. All the adrenaline in his system, along with a cocktail of combat drugs that they would only give to a conscript, somebody with no thought for future side effects, was slowing time down enough for every detail to impress itself on him. The creature's eye sockets were empty. They were more passive sensor pits than active eyes and the blades were glinting in the cold light. Each was a bit longer than a knife but shorter than a sword. The blades were complex too, with holes in to save on weight.