The Belt: The Complete Trilogy
Page 37
“With these suits on, maybe not. But those mules give off a lot of EMF—enough possibly for a drone to detect.”
“Where is it now?”
“It’s headed away northward at high speed.”
Scott glanced up again. “Okay, let me know if it comes back.”
“Will do.”
“And Cyrus?”
“Yeah?”
“Let’s keep it between ourselves for now.”
Cyrus nodded. “Understood.”
4
Drones
It wasn’t long before the drone returned. This time they could all see it as a black dot traversing the northern sky, skimming the underside of the cloud bank. The team stood mute as they tracked it moving slowly westward until it finally disappeared back into the cloud bank.
“What was that?” Spinner’s voice crackled in Scott’s headset.
“Scout drone,” replied Scott.
“You mean we’re being hunted down?” said Jonesy.
“It’s just a flyby—it doesn’t mean anything.” Scott tried to calm things down a bit, take the heat of Jonesy’s fear so that everyone could stay focused on the mission.
“It’s searching for something,” said Spinner. “Maybe we were spotted before we flew into that electrical storm, and now it’s trying to find us again.” He was still looking up to where the drone had disappeared in the cloud bank.
“Maybe. Then again, maybe not. Let’s not concern ourselves with it—we need to keep going.”
One by one they started moving, cautiously glancing skyward every now and again for any sign that the scout drone had returned.
As they progressed, the landscape around them began to change. The road narrowed and twisted, and the sides rose up until they found themselves walking through a shallow canyon. Here and there, new trails would break off from the main road and wind a path up the sides of the canyon walls to what looked like entrances into old, abandoned mines. Scott wondered what creatures, if any, lurked in those dark holes in the rock. More than once he thought he saw some movement within, but kept it to himself and brushed it aside as just his paranoia.
Their progress was good, and Scott’s confidence began to build as the team drew closer to the entrance of the Dyrell Labs facility. As they rounded a bend in the road, he could now make out its crumbled outline in the distance, less than a kilometer ahead.
That’s when Cyrus grabbed Scott’s arm. “Wait.” The engineer was looking at an area of the sky almost directly overhead. “It’s coming back.”
“Where?” Scott looked up and scanned the cloud bank.
“Coming in fast.” Cyrus turned to Scott. “We better find some cover—quick.”
“Okay,” said Scott as he turned back to the others. “Let’s get out of sight. Over there.” He pointed up to a spot on the canyon wall with a deep overhang. “We’ll take cover under that until it passes.”
They started running just as the drone burst out from the clouds. It banked hard and came in fast down along the route of the road, getting lower as it approached them.
Someone fired off a plasma shot.
“What the hell!” Scott stopped and looked around to see who was firing. “For God’s sake, don’t shoot at it.”
“Why the hell not?” Jonesy was readying his weapon again just as the drone banked around and came in for another flyby.
“It’s just a data drone—a scout. Now you’re telling it we’re a threat.”
“Damn right we are.” Jonesy let loose another blast just as the drone came in on a low pass. His shot struck the drone on the side and encased the machine in an incandescent blue ball of electrical craziness. It sparked and fizzled and the drone dropped out of the sky, smashing into the road a few hundred meters ahead. It bounced once, twice, and then exploded.
“Yeehaw! God dang, did you see that? I took that bitch down.” Jonesy jumped and hollered.
Scott ran over to him and yanked the plasma weapon from Jonesy’s grip with such force that Jonesy lost his balance and fell over.
“You crazy bastard. Do you realize what you’ve done?” Scott was furious.
Jonesy rolled over, trying to pick himself up from the dirt. “Probably saved all your asses, is all. That thing could have taken us all out.”
Scott jumped down on him and pinned him to the ground. He groped for the catch on Jonesy’s visor as the miner tried to fight him off. Scott found the button and the visor popped open.
The miner’s eyes widened and his face reconfigured into a look of horror. “What the… You trying to kill me?” He tried to close the visor, but he was pinned.
Scott aimed a punch for Jonesy’s exposed face.
“Scott—no!” Steph grabbed his arm just as Cyrus and Spinner came over and tried to haul him off the stricken miner.
“Jeez, Scott. Get a grip, buddy.” Cyrus grabbed Scott’s other arm and pulled him off.
Scott relaxed a little and stared wild-eyed at the miner. “That was just a dumb scout drone collecting data. It would have taken hours for there to be a response to our being here. But no, you had to go shoot it down. Now it’ll escalate us up to a security threat.” Scott slowly stood up and took a few steps back. “You know what that means, you dumb ass? It means this place will soon be crawling with drones…and these ones will be armed. It means you could have screwed the entire mission.” He kicked the ground in frustration.
“Hey, take it easy, man.” Spinner held a hand up to Scott, then turned and went to help Jonesy up from the dirt.
“Yeah, well, I didn’t sign up for this shit.” Jonesy snapped his visor closed.
“Cool it, Jonesy.” Spinner grabbed him by the shoulder and jerked a finger at his face. “Just shut the hell up for once.”
Jonesy stayed quiet, but eyed Scott with extreme suspicion just in case he decided to make another go for him.
“He’s right,” said Spinner, turning back to Scott. “This is not what we signed up for. It was supposed to be a quick in-out job. Get you guys into the facility, that’s all. Not all this Rambo shit.”
“Yeah, and we want more money. Double the contract…call it danger money.” Jonesy squared himself up, facing off against Scott. “Now I probably got radiation poisoning, thanks to you.”
“I said cool it, Jonesy.” Spinner looked like he meant business, and Jonesy backed off.
“You’re fine. Levels are very low here.” Steph stepped in between them, and they all took a moment to calm down.
“Look, Scott.” Spinner’s tone was calm. “If what you say is right, then the mission is over. I say we contact the mothership and get a rescue shuttle down here to pull us out.”
Scott took a deep breath. “There is no rescue shuttle—not anymore. Your buddy here took care of that. The AI that controls this region has probably escalated the incident, so it will be operating on a security protocol now. That means nothing will be allowed in or out of here.”
“What do you mean, ‘no shuttle?’” Jonesy’s face had a look of incredulity.
“What he means,” said Cyrus, “is that when you shot down that scout drone, you changed the game.”
“So, you want to go on?” said Spinner.
Scott looked over at the miner. “Even if we wanted to scrub the mission, we can’t. Our shuttle is dead in the water and, according to Razzo, won’t be operational for another few hours. By that time, this area will be drone central. So, we have no choice… We need to get into that facility as soon as humanly possible. Only then do we have a chance.”
“Well, that’s just peachy…” Jonesy was about to say more, but Spinner gave him a look that suggested he’d had just about enough of Jonesy’s bullshit, and that any more would end in violence—this time from him.
“It will take us another half an hour or so to reach the entrance. The same again to get to the first of the ventilation shafts. Then it will be up to you to get us in.” Scott pointed a finger at Spinner.
“How long have we got before more d
rones show up?” said Spinner.
“I started getting a signature from that scout drone around two hours after we dropped into Earth’s atmosphere,” said Cyrus. “My guess is we’ve got about the same: two hours, tops.”
“So, we don’t have any time to waste. Come on, let’s keep moving.” Scott turned and strode off down the road. The others followed.
Cyrus had moved up beside Scott and the two had been walking together in silence for some time. “That Jonesy guy is a goddamn liability,” he eventually said.
Scott checked his comm to make sure it was on person-to-person. “Yeah, he’s been a pain in the ass ever since we left Mars.”
“Couldn’t they have found us a better mining crew than these bozos?”
“They’re the best of the best at what they do, apparently. That being digging their way in and out of places that no one else can access.” Scott sighed. “The truth is, we need them, Cyrus. I know it’s a pain, but we’re stuck with it now.”
“Jeez, he had to go and shoot down that drone.”
“Just keep those eyes of yours sharp. We’ll be needing them before the day’s out.”
Cyrus went silent for a while, periodically scanning the sky above. “It should have been a military operation.”
“You’re raking over old ground, Cyrus. We’ve been through all that. The decision was made to operate under the guise of a scientific survey mission. Less suspicious, and that drone would have simply tagged us as that.”
“I know, and I get it. A military mission could have been regarded as an act of war, but…”
“But nothing.” Scott stopped for a beat and looked at the engineer. “We’ve just had some bad luck, that’s all. We can still pull this off.” He moved on again.
“We can’t fight off a swarm of military drones, if they come for us. We need to get out of here somehow—find a cave or an old mine and maybe hide out until the shuttle is fixed.”
“I’m not giving up on this just yet. Another hour and we should be there.”
“Another hour and we could all be dead.”
Scott stopped again. “I’m not going to hide, Cyrus. We have to keep going. We just have to find a way.”
“Scott, you and I have been through a lot of scrapes together, but this isn’t about Athena, or Solomon’s pan-solar QI network, or saving humanity from itself. For you this is about Miranda, isn’t it?”
Scott stayed silent for a beat and lowered his head. “Now isn’t the time to bring that up, Cyrus. We have a job to do.”
“I bring it up because it’s clouding your judgment, Scott. Christ, you nearly killed that Jonesy guy back there. I’ve never seen you like that.”
“Yeah, I know—I lost it with him. Not good. I shouldn’t have done that.” He stopped again and looked at Cyrus. “Perhaps you’re right. Maybe you should take Steph and the others and find a cave to hole up in until the shuttle is back in the air. I’ll take one of the mules and carry on by myself. I don’t want to put any more lives at risk.”
“No way, buddy. Miranda was my friend, too, and Steph’s, so you’re not getting out of it that easily. Going on your own is crazy. You know that, Scott. We can all still get out of this—we can come back and try another time.”
“No… I’m not turning back now. I can’t, Cyrus. Not when I’m so close.”
But Cyrus didn’t answer. The engineer was frozen on the spot, looking up at the northern sky.
Scott turned his head in the same direction, but could see nothing. “What is it?”
“Drones…two. No, wait…three. Coming in fast.”
“Shit, so soon? Goddamnit, I thought we’d have more time.” Scott looked around for any cover they could use, then flipped his comms to broadcast. “Drones!” he shouted, then pointed up at the canyon wall where a path led to an old mine entrance. “Up there—everybody head for that opening. We’ll take cover inside.”
Steph was first to respond. She ran ahead with Cyrus, one of the robotic mules following close behind.
Scott waved frantically at Spinner and Jonesy, who had lagged behind. “Move, move!”
The two miners took a second to orient themselves, but they too were soon running for the mine entrance, with the second mule increasing its speed to match them.
They had just reached the halfway point up the winding path to the entrance when the first of the drones screamed past, then a second, and a third.
Scott glanced back to see them bank high up in the southern sky and prepare for another flyby. “Hurry, they’re coming back,” he shouted into his comms, and looked around to wait for the two miners to catch up.
The first of the drones completed its turn and began to fly straight at them just as Spinner raced past Scott. Jonesy was still behind, taking aim at the drone.
“Jonesy, leave it! Just get inside. Come on, hurry,” Scott shouted into his comm just as the ground beside him was raked by a laser pulse. Dust filled his vision and his suit electronics flickered as it tried to mitigate the electrostatic blast that accompanied the burst of fire. His foot caught on a rock, and he stumbled face-first onto the dusty path. Scott frantically gathered himself up just as another blast of incandescent energy hit the canyon wall above him. His comm was filled with shouts and screams as he ducked in through the mine entrance.
Ahead of him, he could see Cyrus crouching behind a large boulder, weapon in hand, ready to fire. Steph, Spinner, and the mule with the EPR device were working their way in farther down the entrance.
“Where’s Jonesy and the other mule?” said Cyrus as he poked his head out from behind the boulder.
Scott turned around, facing down the tunnel back toward the opening just as Jonesy scrambled in. Behind him, Scott could see the mule—the one with all the mining equipment and explosives—making its way up to the entrance, unaware of the drama playing out around it. It was just about to cross the threshold when it was struck by a short laser burst from above.
It exploded with such force that Scott felt the impact of the shockwave like he had been hit by a small planet. He went careening down the mine entrance, tumbling and bouncing off the walls and the floor for what seemed like an eternity. When he finally stopped tumbling, he could still feel the ground shaking and trembling as the mine entrance collapsed under several tons of rock.
He tried to move, but his body didn’t respond. Then his EVA suit electronics flickered and fizzled, and Scott’s world went dark.
5
VanHeilding
Fredrick VanHeilding sat comfortably in an antique leather wing-backed chair in his personal study on board the family’s vast and luxurious orbital space station. It was currently parked in a geosynchronous orbit high above the central Pacific Ocean. His study was a voluminous, circular area, with most of its walls and the floor manufactured from a thick polymer glass. Through this, the gentle arc of Earth’s curvature could be seen in all its glory.
He had been observing a tropical storm as it tracked its way east across the ocean. It had made landfall over the edge of the North American continent some time ago and was now beginning to dissipate. He enjoyed this simple pleasure: observing the great meteorological weather systems play out in real time, the slow and ceaseless meandering of powerful forces as they moved and shifted across the planet’s surface. He found it deeply soothing, even hypnotic.
An alert flashed in the corner of his eye, by virtue of his biological lenses having been enhanced for a multitude of communications and data display. It was the orbital’s AI, Marlyn.
He sighed at this intrusion into his meditations. Nevertheless, he gestured with one hand to confirm the alert and open comms. “What’s so important that I need to be disturbed?” His voice did not disguise his irritation.
“Please forgive my intrusion on your meditations, sir. However, the algorithm has recently acquired new data that may be of interest to you.”
VanHeilding sighed again. “Somehow I doubt it. But go on, if you must.”
“Approximatel
y three hours ago, a Belt-registered shuttle landed near a region of the Wasteland formally known as Death Valley. It was transporting a scientific survey mission.”
“And I should care, why?” VanHeilding punctuated this response with yet another sigh.
“A team of five persons in full EVA suits and two robotic mules disembarked and headed on foot toward the eastern mountain range. The shuttle, however, remains in situ. We suspect it may have developed some technical issues during its descent.”
“I’m going to give you three seconds to get to the point, otherwise I am terminating this conversation.”
“Yes, sir. I will try to be as succinct as possible.”
“Just get on with it.” VanHeilding’s voice rose a few decibels to signify his increasing irritation.
“The algorithm that controls this region extrapolated a risk variance level sufficient for it to deploy a scout drone to investigate this mission. Unfortunately, when this drone made contact with the team, it was shot down and destroyed.”
“I can’t see how this needs to be brought to my attention. Just arrest them, or eradicate them—I don’t care which—and let me get back to my meditations.”
“If I may, sir, there is more information that you need to be aware of. Prior to the destruction of the drone, it managed to perform a biometric scan of the party to identify the individuals. One of whom is Commander Scott McNabb, formally of the scientific survey vessel Hermes.”
This finally got VanHeilding’s attention. He sat forward in his chair. “McNabb? What the—”
“He is also accompanied by two other members from that crew, namely Chief Engineer Cyrus Sanato, and Chief Medical Officer Dr. Stephanie Rayman.”
VanHeilding stood up. “What the hell are they doing there?”
“Good question, sir. The algorithm escalated the incident and invoked level one security protocols, enabling it to deploy a number of security drones and a contingent of security personnel to investigate the shuttle.”
“And…?”