Resist the Red Battlenaut

by Robert T. Jeschonek

  "We're also continuing to work another angle that could enhance our intel," said Trane. "The DNA and RNA of the Red viral forms aren't native to Shard. We've been comparing the virus' genomes to available genetic databases to determine a likely planet of origin."

  "Which could also be the Reds' planet of origin," added Beauchamp. "Or at least a scientific research hub."

  Perseid nodded. "Status of that effort?"

  "We've covered about 75 percent of the databases," said Trane, "with no success so far. But the A.I. is continuing to cross-check as we speak. I estimate completion in a day and a half."

  "All right then," said Perseid, "but devising Red virus countermeasures is still top priority. That and extracting more intel from Cairn Barrie." He turned his gaze on Scott. "You're going back in soon, right?"

  For what it's worth, Scott wanted to say, but he just nodded. "I'll keep talking to him."

  "Great," said Perseid. "Keep milking your history together, and keep him guessing. He's been throwing you off balance; now it's your turn."

  "Any information could be vital," said Rexis. "Even the smallest throwaway line could turn the tide in our favor."

  "Understood," said Scott.

  "Okay then." Perseid clapped his hands together. "Everybody get back to work. Dismissed."

  *****

  Chapter 25

  Scott spent an hour with Donna in the medicenter, then put his CORE Battlenaut through its paces on the Training Deck to let off some steam. By the time he was done, he'd gone through five hundred rounds of dummy ammo and racked up perfect scores against every solid and holographic target generated for the exercise.

  Unfortunately, he didn't feel much better when it was all over. Having memories of Iridess Chasm and Penitent Peak brought so strongly to the surface made him feel lousy. Knowing Cairn Barrie was back from the dead and holed up in a cell a few decks away stuck a black hole dead center in his belly. It was one thing to have nightmares about his experience; it was something else altogether to have the past brought to life and shoved in his face in the middle of a crisis.

  He just wanted to stop thinking about it for a while, but the Training Deck exercise didn't clear his mind for long. As he climbed out of the cockpit and down the hull of his Battlenaut, the full force of memory surged back to him, rushing into every chink in the mental armor he'd tried to construct. He remembered the screams of his mother and father, the terror he'd felt as black-lipped Vore killed them with knives and dragged him away. He remembered the pain and shock of being murdered himself, beaten to death by Vore on that ledge on Penitent Peak. The sight of little Cairn tumbling off the cliff blazed in front of his inner eye as if it were happening all over again at that very moment.

  He'd spent years dealing with what had happened, breaking it into manageable pieces and pushing them into boxes in his brain. Now that every box had been thrown wide open, he felt like he was teetering on the cliff again, facing a drop of epic proportions.

  With a sigh, he headed for the exit, bound for another session in the lab with Trane and the others. He'd be busy enough to distract himself a little, at least until his next visit to Cairn. He just wished there'd be more to take his mind off Iridess Chasm.

  As if on cue, one of the big gates leading out of the Battlenaut bays shot open in front of him, revealing a towering mass of metal.

  At first, Scott thought it was one of the CORE Battlenauts...but as the armored giant stomped out of the shadows of the bay, he saw that wasn't the case at all. It was a Battlenaut, all right, but not a CORE model.

  In fact, it was almost identical to his Marine Corps Mark VI Battlenaut, the one he'd lost to the Reds on Chelong III. The only major difference he could see was the color; instead of gray plating, this Battlenaut was armored in blue and silver.

  Scott couldn't help smiling. The CORE Battlenauts were more advanced across the board and handled like a dream in combat--but he still had a soft spot for his Marine Corps armor. It was comparatively primitive, but it had saved his skin too many times to count and helped him dispatch a legion of enemies.

  Not to mention, there was something about the lines of it. The CORE units looked sleeker and more humanoid, but this one--it was somehow more exciting. More of a classic, like a boxy old automobile compared to a modern-day no-frills personal transport.

  "I'll be damned." Scott walked up to the Mark VI and ran his fingers over the side of its left ankle. "Now that's a sight for sore eyes."

  The Mark VI raised the gun on its right arm and cranked off three rounds, firing slugs at a floor-mounted solid target clear across the Training Deck. All three slugs punched through the bull's eye in close formation.

  "Nice shooting!" Scott raised his voice so the pilot inside the Battlenaut could hear him. "Who needs A.I. guided targeting with those guns!"

  Just then, a rack of hexagonal plates in the Battlenaut's chest and abdomen folded downward, exposing the cockpit and the pilot within--none other than the ship's helmsman, Vic Fong. "That's one of the things I love about this model. It's totally hands-on."

  Scott stepped back to take in the full height of the Mark VI. "There's something to be said for hands-on. You don't have to worry about your A.I. going rogue, for one thing."

  "And it leaves more room for you to act on instinct, doesn't it?" said Fong. "Your reactions aren't muffled by layers of verbal commands and A.I. subroutines."

  "Plus you only have to worry about trusting yourself, not a computer." Scott nodded and folded his arms over his chest. "I'd ride one into battle again in a heartbeat."

  "Me, too." Fong played the armrest keypads, and the upper body of the Mark VI swiveled from side to side. "But this one's just for show, I'm afraid."

  "That's too bad," said Scott.

  "I'm a hobbyist." Fong played the keypads again, making the guns tilt up and down while the torso kept swiveling. "Instead of restoring antique furniture or classic automobiles, I restore classic Battlenauts."

  "Great hobby." Scott grinned. "How many do you have?"

  "This is the only one aboard ship," said Fong. "But I've got three more back home, including a Mark I in mint condition."

  "How'd you manage that?" said Scott. "The Mark I was decommissioned twelve years ago."

  "I won it." Fong's grin widened. "In a poker game."

  "You're kidding!" said Scott. "A poker game with who? The Commonwealth Secretary of Defense?"

  Fong shook his head. "Just a factory foreman from the plant where they manufactured the Mark I. He ran one last unit through the line before they retooled. Socked it away for a rainy day."

  "And then he lost it playing poker?"

  "What can I say? Drinking made him stupid." Fong shrugged. "And I'm a hell of a poker player. Care for a game sometime?"

  "Only if you bet the Mark VI," said Scott.

  "Not going to happen," said Fong.

  "Can I at least take her for a spin?"

  Fong thought it over. "Sure. What the hell? Just remember, you break it, you bought it." His fingers played the keypads, and the Battlenaut shifted to its knees so he could get out of the cockpit.

  Before Fong could turn over the Mark VI to Scott, though, Trane's voice blared over the Training Deck PA system. "Corporal Scott, report to Lab Five. Corporal Scott, report to Lab Five immediately."

  Scott clenched his jaws as the stress he'd briefly forgotten rushed back in on him. "Damnit." Seeing the Mark VI and talking to Fong had chased it away, but Trane had brought it all right back. "I have to go."

  "No worries," said Fong. "I'm giving you a rain check. You'll get plenty of time behind the wheel of the Mark VI."

  "Thanks." Scott smiled and headed for the door. "I just hope we won't have to wait for the end of the war to find that time."

  *****

  "Call your grandma!" shouted Trane as soon as Scott walked into Lab Five. "You need to call her right now!"

  Scott frowned. "What the hell are you talking about?" Looking around the lab, he saw Abby, Khalil,
and Feinberg staring back at him. They were all sitting around a holographic projection of a red letter "X" in a red circle, spinning on its Y-axis like a penny on edge.

  "We've just been data-blocked." Trane stalked back and forth like a tiger in its cage, eyes wide and wild. "Just as we were finally making progress tracking the viral DNA, someone threw a data-block on us. Now we can't go any further down that trail!"

  "Wait," said Scott. "What trail, exactly?"

  "The Red firewall virus," said Khalil. "We couldn't match its full genome to anything on file, so we tried pieces of it. Ultimately, we matched a piece of its DNA to an engineered virus from an old military medical R&D project."

  "What kind of R&D project?" said Scott.

  "Something to do with post-traumatic stress disorder," said Feinberg. "Prevention of PTSD, not treatment."

  "It was called Project Lethe," said Khalil. "It started 25 years ago on the Commonwealth capitol world, Archibald. Part of the firewall virus matches part of a virus created for Lethe, though other parts don't match at all."

  "And that's all we know," said Feinberg. "Because just as we reached deeper, somebody data-blocked us. We were locked out of the channel. No matter where we search, Project Lethe never shows up."

  "That's why we need you to call your granny!" shouted Scott. "We need Commandant Chalice to get us past the block!"

  "From what we can gather, it was put there by Military Intelligence," said Khalil. "One of their A.I. drones, anyway. Project Lethe must be on a watch list of some kind."

  "And you can't get past the block on your own?" said Scott.

  Suddenly, Trane shot forward and snapped out his words in Scott's face. "If we could do that, we wouldn't be begging you to call Grandma, would we?"

  Scott wanted to force Trane to back away from him, but he didn't. Instead, he squared his shoulders and matched his gaze with an icy stare. "I've already got a call in to her," he said stiffly.

  "Perfect!" said Trane. "Then you'll ask her about removing the block?"

  "I'll see what I can do," said Scott. "No promises."

  "She has to help us." Trane lurched away from Scott and paced across the lab. "This is a bona fide lead on the Reds. I can feel it."

  "The fact that we've been data-blocked just confirms it," said Abby. "We were getting close to something important. Otherwise, our search wouldn't have been shut down."

  "The block also suggests high-level involvement," said Feinberg. "It takes someone with serious pull to order an A.I. drone that throws blocks like that."

  Trane stopped pacing. "All I know is, this could be the key to everything. This could lead us straight to the Reds, reveal their plans, and end their stealth tactics. It could literally save the Commonwealth."

  "I understand." Scott nodded. "I'll try to reach the Commandant again and let you know what happens."

  "When?" said Trane. "Right after you leave here?"

  "Yes," said Scott. "Right after that."

  "I'll go with you." Trane marched over and stopped in front of him. "I can explain the technical fine points."

  "That's all right." Scott turned and headed for the door. "I think I can manage."

  *****

  As promised, Scott tried again to contact Grandma Bern...but the result was the same. According to Bern's assistant, Lori, the Commandant was not available.

  "Can you tell me when Commandant Chalice might return my call?" asked Scott.

  "I'm so sorry, but no." Lori, whose holographic form was seated across the round black table from Scott, smiled sadly and shook her head. "That information is classified, actually."

  Scott frowned, wondering what his grandmother was up to this time. The fact that she'd been unreachable for days, and her whereabouts were classified, told him she was involved in something far from routine.

  Even so, his own business was pretty important. "Is there any way you can get a message to her? It regards an urgent security matter."

  Lori winced. "Unlikely, Solomon." Her expression changed to a smile. "But for you, I can try."

  Scott grinned. "I can't thank you enough. I wouldn't ask if it wasn't critically important."

  "I know that," Lori said brightly. "So what's the message?"

  "Actually," said Scott, "I'd prefer to send it to you under encryption."

  "You do realize this entire communication is encrypted, don't you?" said Lori.

  "Trust me," said Scott. "It's not enough."

  *****

  There in the comm booth, he recorded his message for Bern, telling her what they'd found out about the firewall virus and Project Lethe. He told her about the data-block and the need to dig deeper as only she could. He begged her to do anything she could to help get to the bottom of the Reds' secrets and give the Diamondbacks the edge they needed to save the Commonwealth from whatever the Reds had in store.

  He also told her about the theory that a conspiracy in the upper echelons of the Commonwealth might be the driving force behind the Reds. He asked her to investigate as best she could and let him know what she found.

  And then he told her about Cairn Barrie. If anyone could fully appreciate the significance of reconnecting with Cairn, it was Bern. Back during Scott's recovery from the events in Iridess Chasm, not a day had gone by without Bern at his side, helping him through the struggle to regain the future he'd almost lost. Without hesitation, she had stepped into the role of his murdered parents, getting him through the crisis and going on to raise him in the years that followed.

  Though she wasn't at his side now, he still felt like he was unburdening himself to her. It felt good to get things off his chest; he was tempted to tell her much more--about Donna, about the battle on Shard, about how tough it was being the only one who could see and sense everything related to the Reds. But he knew his time on the comm channel was limited, so he wrapped up his message.

  "Call me as soon as you can," he said. "And remember, I love you."

  With that, he closed the channel. He left the booth just in time, as it turned out; Dr. Beauchamp paged him over the P.A. just as he walked out into the hall.

  *****

  Chapter 26

  "Testing," said Beauchamp, speaking into the glowing red holographic microphone floating in front of her mouth. "Testing, testing, one, two, three."

  Scott gave her a thumbs-up from across the anteroom of the brig. Her voice was coming in with crystal clarity through the earpiece he was wearing. "Got it." He nodded and adjusted the way the earpiece was seated in his ear. "Loud and clear, Doctor." He walked over to join her by the cell door.

  "Very good." Beauchamp handed him a thin silver wand, twenty centimeters long, with a spherical crystal on the end no bigger than the tip of his little finger. "Use this to scan him. It is already set to take the readings we need. However..." She handed over a tablet computer. "...you must use this to record your findings. Remember to type all data into the form, since the actual data from the wand will not likely be visible to anyone but you."

  Scott nodded. This was why Beauchamp had paged him after he'd made his call to Bern--to gather medical data from Cairn. To anyone other than Scott, every sensor scan of Cairn looked perfectly blank, as if the cell in which he was imprisoned was empty.

  "Take your time and capture all the data you can," said Beauchamp. "Remember, it is just as crucial that we study Cairn's physiology as the Red Battlenaut wreckage. We must confirm Trane's two-virus theory--or reject it and develop another."

  "Right," said Scott. "There's just one thing I don't understand." He held up the diagnostic wand in one hand and the tablet in the other. "How am I supposed to type up the data if I don't have both hands free?"

  Beauchamp's thick red lips curved upward in a smile that seemed tinged with pure pleasure. All her expressions had that same sensuous flavor. "Use your nose?" Though her voice was throaty, her laugh was a girlish giggle.

  Scott raised the tablet and pretended to try to type with his nose--then shook his head. "That won't work."
r />   "Here." She took the wand and tablet from him. "Allez oop." Still smiling, she plugged the skinny end of the wand into a jack on the top edge of the tablet, then handed it all back to him.

  "Ah." Scott nodded. "Now this makes sense."

  "Just point this at the subject and switch on the tablet." Beauchamp tapped the crystal on the tip of the wand. "The tablet is already programmed to run the desired tests in sequence. You will view the results in one window." She tapped the screen of the tablet with one glossy red nail. "You will retype the data in another window alongside it."

  "Okay, fine," said Scott. "No problem."

  Beauchamp's eyes glittered when she looked at him. "If there is a problem, simply excuse yourself, and you and I will iron it out."

  "The only problem I can think of right now is the person on the other side of this door." He bobbed his head toward the cell. "I doubt he'll cooperate."

  "Perhaps you could try a different approach." Beauchamp tipped her head to one side and narrowed her eyes. "Instead of trying to access sensitive information, see if you can engage him in small talk. Ask him about things that have nothing to do with the Reds--his life before he met them, his family, his home. Ignore his efforts to bait you. Just try to open a dialogue."

  Scott shrugged. "I'll give it a try. But he really hates me."

  Beauchamp clasped her hands behind her back and leaned forward with a smile and one raised eyebrow. "Perhaps his true feelings are more complex than that. Give him a chance to come around, Corporal Scott. He might surprise you."

  *****

  When Scott entered the cell, Cairn was on the floor doing push-ups. He wasn't breathing hard; maybe he'd just gotten started.

  "Sol!" He barked out the word between reps. "Funny meeting...you here."