The Huralon Incident

by E A Wicklund

  In the end, their slipshod security cost them their lives.

  Mere moments later, a metallic hand brushed away chunks of the pilot’s skull and brain from the cockpit console. Perhaps it was heartless to dispense with his organs so casually, but the machine wasn’t programmed to care. The Reaper, Special Operations Commando, finished cleaning off the console while more of the special ops machines entered the shuttle. The first unreeled a communications cable from a datapad-sized device and plugged it into a perfectly matching port on the control panel. Shortly, the face of Ando appeared on the device’s display.

  “Okay, signal established,” he said. “Uploading simulacrum. This is some of my best work, guys, honestly. It really looks like Castellano. Okay…upload complete. You’re ready to go, boys. Go get ’em.”

  Under normal conditions, the Reapers would have been under remote control by Springbok’s marine remote operators. Had they been there, they might have enjoyed Ando’s cheery sendoff. As it was, the Reapers would be operating far from the ship with a delay of up to four seconds for the control signals to travel, completely impractical for potentially close-quarters combat. The machines operated autonomously instead, relying on the Expert Systems installed into their molecular computer brains to execute the op plan.

  The Expert Systems were by no means AIs or the sentient ACEs (Artificial ConsciousnEsses), but they were very good at problem-solving in one particular field. In this case, they possessed all the skills necessary to assault and take control of a warship.

  The device the Reaper attached to the shuttle did contain an AI. Nearly all AIs had a name, rather than a designation. This one was named, “Helen of Troy.”

  Helen began hacking into the software aboard the shuttle. It suppressed the shuttle’s defensive software and finished in milliseconds, nearly effortlessly cracking the simple computer. Its attack proceeded with casual ease, McCray noted, as he watched the mission progress in the tank. To him, Helen’s easy dominance over the enemy shuttle seemed like a grown man restraining an angry child with one hand while calmly sipping whiskey with the other. Within another two seconds, it controlled every system aboard the shuttle.

  The shuttle disengaged from Springbok, engaged dark paddles, and zoomed away at over three-hundred gravities acceleration. As the small craft raced back to its mother ship, the AI used the shuttle’s own systems to send a signal to DPS Scirocco.

  ***

  Second Lieutenant Qaas thought it was strange. He didn’t expect the marines to return so soon. Add to it, Captain Castellano sounded…weird. Standard officer training taught officers that whenever something seemed wrong, say something, but then reality rarely equaled training. He glanced furtively around the bridge of the Scirocco, hoping for guidance from a more experienced officer. Unfortunately, there were no more senior and more experienced personnel standing watch with him. His former captain would never have left anyone so junior as OOD (Officer Of the Deck) without a senior officer available and certainly not during a boarding action.

  His orders were to contact the captain if anything strange happened. Qaas only had a feeling something was wrong. Nothing concrete, but he felt sure there was a problem. Then again, what if he was wrong? Captain Mallouk would probably order more disciplinary action, and Qaas’s butt still hadn’t healed from the last caning.

  While growing up in a shanty town, he seldom encountered the Elites. Whenever he did, they ignored him as if he were a piece of furniture. The tales told about the upper class seemed too unbelievable to be true, but now that one served as his captain, Qaas knew the tales weren’t instructive enough. He felt as if he were a dog and the Captain his careless, indifferent owner.

  His stomach rumbled sympathetically, as if remembering the last cuts to his rations. Unlike his previous captains, all these thoughtlessly tossed out punishments served to paralyze rather than instruct. Even knowing this, Qaas still feared punishment too much to overcome it. As OOD, the ship’s security was his responsibility, but when the likely result of any decision on his part was either neglect or punishment, he hardly felt empowered either way. The smartest move seemed to be, do nothing. But if he was right about his suspicions and he didn’t call Mallouk, he had no idea what would happen. Perhaps he would be shot and discarded like an aging beast of burden. If he were wrong, the worst might be another cut to his food.

  That sort of settled the matter for him.

  He opened a channel to the Captain’s quarters.

  The tones in his ear rang for a long time. Qaas began to wonder if the Captain would answer him at all. Eventually, his screen updated with Mallouk’s scowling visage. “The ship had better be burning, Qaas,” growled Mallouk.

  “Ah...no, sir.”

  “You interrupted my official duties for nothing?”

  Qaas could see the scene behind the Captain. One of the “comfort women” sat on the ornate four-poster bed, a mattress easily as large as Qaas’s quarters. The woman’s dress lay half torn off. A livid bruise grew upon her cheek. She held one limp arm in her hand as she keened in pain. Med techs attended to her, trying to calm her down.

  Qaas looked away from the scene for a moment, hiding his revulsion.

  “Get her out of here, you dogs,” bellowed Mallouk. “And send in the other one.” He turned back. “Well, Qaas? What’s going on?”

  “Captain Castellano is returning, sir. I think something is wrong.”

  “What happened? Is he injured? Incapacitated?”

  “No, sir. He claims the mission is a success. But he’s acting strangely.”

  Mallouk rolled his eyes. “You’re so damned green, Qaas. It’s probably post-battle elation. As Marine Liaison, you’re supposed to know about such things, not panic and interrupt your captain’s official work.”

  “I’m sorry, sir. He was asking to speak with you.”

  “Me? He usually avoids me. All right, patch him through. And Qaas?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “We’ll be discussing your lack of discipline later on.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Qaas transferred the call and put his head in his hands. Likely, his meager pay would be cut once more. He sighed, thinking about how much he hated the captain and his damned ship.

  ***

  In Mallouk’s cabin, the image of Captain Castellano appeared on the screen. “Mission accomplished, sir. I’ve got loot.”

  Mallouk grimaced. “You? You are bringing back the cargo?”

  “Not all of it, of course. We’ll need more shuttles to get it all.”

  “I must confess, I’m surprised Captain. After all of those ridiculous lectures about the Honor of the Corps and a Marine’s true duty, this is unexpected. Now, I am hearing that you brought back that ship’s cargo without being ordered to. I’m shocked, to be honest.”

  “A man can change, can’t he?”

  Mallouk absently brushed at his perfumed beard, a symbol of his connections to the inner political circles of the DPM. “I suppose. I’ll send out the salvage crews. Let them get the rest of it, and get your marines out quickly. They shouldn’t be aboard when the accident happens.”

  “Copy that, sir. Perhaps we should provide security for the demolitions team?”

  “What demolitions team? Just secure engineering, and our techs will rig the fusion bottle. Stop thinking, Castellano. Just let me handle the details.”

  “Copy that. Castellano, out.”

  Mallouk stared at the screen, thinking hard. He wasn’t completely convinced Castellano could change so abruptly. Jesus’s ethical conviction had frequently astonished the captain, even when the prospect of kingly riches could’ve been his. The marine might have been an outstanding military commander, but his ridiculous code of ethics made him anathema to Mallouk. What had happened that he would change so suddenly?

  Another girl entered his quarters and promptly removed the long dress the women were required to wear. It covered them from neck to toe, a symbol of chastity, though most of the crew knew what t
he comfort women’s true purpose was. The dresses were largely ceremonial.

  At sixteen, the new girl was older and more experienced than the previous one. She kneeled between his legs and deftly pulled at the seal at his pants crotch.

  At least this one knew how to behave before her betters. He ignored her as he thought about Castellano’s curious behavior. Qaas was right. Castellano was indeed acting strangely. He called up the computer files and briefly considered rescinding the promise to discipline Qaas. The young man had proven perceptive after all. He ordered a slash to Qaas’s rations anyway. If he changed his mind about discipline, Qaas might believe he could sway the will of his captain. It just wouldn’t do for one of the lower-caste to start getting ideas.

  ***

  The marine shuttle alighted on the deck of Scirocco’s boat bay. Crewmen, in various colored vests representing their roles in EVA Ops, approached the shuttle. Some stood ready to attend to the marines, others stood ready to secure the craft from space operations.

  The clam shell aft hatch opened, and the bored expression of the marine armorer changed to confusion. He stared at the copper-colored devices, each one folded up into cube. The shuttle was filled with them. “Hey, Dominic!” he called. “What the hell is this?”

  Dominic, the lead marine armorer, arrived and stared. “Weird” He reached out to touch a device. It unfolded suddenly, throwing him aside like a ragdoll. In less than a second, the Reaper unwrapped from a tight fetal position and stood a full seven feet tall over the shocked crewman. He only had time for his jaw to drop before the Reaper’s stunner weapon fired, flashing like lightning and locking up his nervous system. He collapsed, unconscious.

  The remaining seventeen Reapers unfolded and hurtled out of the shuttle, scanning for targets. The alien-designed machines were slender with muscular-looking, exotic-carbon limbs. Unlike similar weapons designed by human designers, these were never intended to house a pilot. The result was a lean, aerodynamic-looking weapon that carried no extra weight and moved with uncanny speed.

  The first humans who encountered Reapers on the battlefield had said they looked like metal animals with huge rear legs and smaller forearms. The body leaned forward, nearly parallel to the ground, while the articulated head arced up high. Some described them as Killer Kangaroos armed with heavy-weapons and a bad attitude. The export version, now operating for humans, spread chaos and terror through Scirocco’s boat bay. Crewmen started running in all directions, but that caused little trouble for the heavily-armed Reapers.

  Four-light seconds away, McCray watched the action from cameras mounted on each machine’s muscular-looking forearms. The view shook slightly whenever the five-barreled hypersonic gatling guns fired. Attached outside the guns were stunner weapons, discharging a literal lightning bolt of electricity. Crewmen struck by them, would feel their muscles spasm all at once and the screams proved it was an excruciating experience. McCray couldn’t follow everything even one machine did. Counting the spinal-mounted gun and the head-mounted gun, each Reaper could fire in four directions simultaneously, several times per second.

  Lighting bolts flashed and crackled across the bay like a mad lightning storm. Screaming crewmen tried to seek cover or escape through exits, but the fast moving Reapers made it impossible. No source of cover ever was truly safe, as sprinting Reapers overran any shelter long before a crewman completely hid behind it. No one escaped to an exit, either. The Reapers made anyone running for help a primary target. Bodies of crewmen, unconscious after being shot, piled up around the bay’s three exits.

  Though none of the stunned crewman were permanently harmed, any marine in full combat armor received different treatment, because stunners did not work on armored troops.

  Eight hypervelocity 4mm tungsten penetrators arrived at the carapace of his armor before an unlucky marine could fire. The rounds may have been small, but after traveling at Mach 7 they struck with more energy than an elephant gun. The rounds ripped through his armor like a steak knife through a watermelon, pulping his flesh into a tomato puree-like mash. The marine died long before his corpse hit the ground.

  The entire boat bay action took less than eight seconds to complete. Reapers stepped around the unconscious crew, firing a foam across them. Within seconds the foam hardened into an epoxy-like solid, affixing the crewmen to the deck. They would likely wake up after five minutes, so it wouldn’t do for them to stand up and reach a comms panel to sound an alarm.

  Boat bay secure and their presence still unreported, McCray could see that his outrageous plan was working so far. Since no hostile ship had been boarded in over six hundred years, ship designers did not usually bother with surveillance aboard ships. That was considered paranoid overbuilding and hardly cost effective. This worked in his favor for now as the Reapers sprinted into the ship’s passageways. They dashed along until they encountered an unfortunate crewman. McCray saw him gape for a split second at the alien-designed machines. He turned and reached for a nearby comms port upon a bulkhead, attempting to sound an alarm. The lead machine fired its stunner, and the crewman fell unconscious centimeters away from the port.

  The machine that held the AI, “Helen of Troy" approached the same comms port. The datapad-sized device sported a communications cable perfectly matching the comms port, yet another feature kindly provided by the intelligence operatives in IS-3.

  The Reaper plugged the AI in and attached it to the bulkhead. Watching from Springbok, McCray shook his head, wondering at the unexpected boon from Castellano as his high-level login helped the AI go to work in an aspect of war measured in picoseconds. Its assault upon the ship’s computers wasn’t nearly so easy as on the shuttle. It would take time—time the Reapers could not wait for. The group dashed off, leaving the AI attached to the port to do its work or self-destruct.

  They raced through the passageways at speeds up to seventy kilometers per hour, far faster than the swiftest human sprinter. It was the highest safe speed they could reach in the tight confines of a ship. Though they ran hard, they hardly made a sound. A shape-changing putty on their footpads reached for the deck with every step. The ActiveMorph putty formed itself perfectly to dampen the blow of their feet, thus eliminating sound. Though silent they still had to run fast. Their assault had gone unreported so far, proving the effectiveness of the machines. Though he wasn’t watching in real time—the distance between the two ships being four light-seconds—he couldn’t help murmuring encouragement to the incredible Reapers.

  They split up, five heading for engineering and four for the bridge. Nine sprinted into Gator Country where the marines billeted and maintained the armory. The count of crewman caught in restraining foam in their wake rose. Though it was a necessity to prevent an alarm sounding too soon, someone finding restrained crewman would eventually give the game away.

  ***

  On the bridge, Mallouk barked at Qaas as he angrily stomped in. The enlisted watchstanders shied away from him, hoping to escape the angry captain’s notice. For them, successful cringing could literally mean the difference between life and death.

  Mallouk hovered over Qaas. “Have you heard from Castellano yet?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Why not?”

  “I don’t know, sir,” quaked Qaas, steadfastly remaining focused on his screen. He didn’t want to look at the Captain, not after seeing what he’d done to that poor girl. “He should’ve arrived by now.”

  Mallouk pointed at the data stream display on Qaas’s screen. “And what is that? A game? Are you playing games on watch, Qaas?”

  The Second Lieutenant cringed at yet another unwarranted accusation. “Sir,” he said with exaggerated patience. “It’s a very large amount of data transfers from near the boat bay. I’m trying to figure out what it is.”

  “Well that’s Castellano, probably. Recording his report.”

  Qaas shook his head. “Not possible, sir. If he were recording a video, for instance, the data stream would be hundred times smaller. This
is just enormous. ”

  “Cripes, Qaas. You only mention this now?”

  “I’m sorry, sir.” Qaas glanced away. “I was concerned about proper discipline.”

  “Damn you, boy!” Mallouk pounded the console. “Qaas, you…Qaas. Look at me.”

  “What?” Qaas said into his mic, as he received an emergency report from below decks. “What do you mean?”

  At last, Mallouk got a hold over himself. Perhaps he realized something had gone seriously awry and the ship desperately needed her captain in control. He spoke calmly, “What’s going on, Qaas?”

  “Captain,” Qaas said, shuddering. “Everyone in the boat bay is down. They’re stuck in some weird…plastic.”

  Mallouk’s eyes bulged. “We’re being boarded. Sound General Quarters. Weapons!” He pointed into the bridge’s tank. “Fire on Princely Dawn. Destroy that damned ship.”

  The Ensign at weapons responded, but his fingertips tapped fruitlessly at his screen as sirens began to wail. “Automatic targeting controls are out. I’m sorry, Captain. I should’ve received an alert but I didn’t. What’s going on?”

  “We’re being hacked,” breathed Qaas, finally realizing what that data stream was.

  “Then fire on manual, you dog,” bellowed Mallouk.

  The Ensign groaned but set to work. Qaas sympathized with the officer’s plight. Manually firing the ship’s lasers was possible, but it required such precision that it was damn near impossible, something like knitting an infant’s sweater with a pair of baseball bats. He watched the weapons officer trying and failing with mounting horror, knowing the chance he would hit anything was nil. He wracked his brain, trying to figure a way out of the untenable situation.

  “What’s the delay?” screeched Mallouk, rushing over to the weapons station.

  While the Ensign visibly struggled with the low-tech, counter-intuitive controls, an enraged Captain hovering, the primitive manual trackball proved hopelessly archaic. His panic at the roaring of his captain only made a bad situation worse.