They moved on, fanning out either side of Beckman, following paths of melted metal formed by chance between twisted funeral mounds, like ants crawling over the corpse of a great beast.
“Would have died fast,” Tucker muttered as he glanced at the flash imprint of an amphibian inside a transport cell.
“That’s how I want to go,” Nuke said, “Blink and I’m dead. Feel nothing!”
“Be careful what you wish for, Lieutenant.” Tucker said, nodding meaningfully at Nuke’s pack.
Nuke looked startled, having forgotten Beckman would order the detonation if they were cornered.
When they were almost halfway through the chamber, Xeno pointed off to the right. “Another hole over there!”
Beckman looked at the dark cavity in the sleep chamber wall. It had been partly hidden by debris sucked into its mouth during decompression. He ran his eye around the distant walls of the chamber, picking out one dark hole after another, each partially camouflaged by the surrounding shadows. Markus stopped beside him, following his gaze.
“Notice the angles?” Beckman asked thoughtfully.
“Yeah,” Markus nodded. “This was no accident.”
Beckman was certain, the terrible wounds suffered by the great ship all converged on that one point. “Someone was shooting at this chamber, trying to kill the people here.”
“They succeeded,” Markus said apprehensively. “Everyone on board is dead. It can’t be a threat, but whoever destroyed it is.”
“Someone’s controlling those machines,” Beckman said. “And we don’t know why this ship was destroyed, or even what’s going on outside our own atmosphere. Until I know the good guys from the bad guys, I’m taking no chances.”
Beckman moved off, while Markus’ hid his frustration and followed, wondering if he would get a chance to steal the device Nuke was carrying; all too aware that Tucker watched the payload specialist’s every move.
For nearly an hour, they picked their way through the chamber, finding no sign of life. When they were nearly two thirds of the way across, Bandaka held his spear up, signaling them to listen. Behind the hunter, everyone went quiet, then they heard the distant scraping of loose metal. It was the first sound they’d heard not of their making. For several seconds, there was nothing but silence, then the crash of a heavy object landing on crumpled metal reached them. Bandaka pointed to a mound of debris ahead, signaling the source lay beyond it.
Beckman and Markus crept to the top of the mound, then cautiously peered down into the valley beyond. Standing knee deep in twisted metal was a white bipedal machine. It had thick metallic arms and legs, a multijointed torso, and unlike the other machines they’d seen, a large elongated metal dome for a head rather than a flat sensor disk. At the end of each arm were four short, double jointed metal fingers that could move in any direction.
Beckman knew at a glance the suit had the proportions of the alien corpse Xeno had examined. “No survivors, huh?” Beckman whispered.
“We should try to capture it, for questioning.”
“Don’t you mean, make friendly contact?”
Markus shrugged, “That too.”
The heavy lift suit stood with its back to Beckman, showing no sign its occupant was aware of being observed. The suit effortlessly wrenched a blackened girder free to reveal a trapped octagonal transport cell, then finding the cell fatally crushed, placed the dead cell on the mound behind it. When it turned, Beckman saw a transparent face plate revealing an elongated chin and a forward sloping forehead.
Nemza’ri stopped as a forward looking suit sensor detected multiple heat sources nearby. The thermal readings were much higher than for her own kind, and in an area she’d already searched for survivors. She turned sharply and using a thermal track for direction, looked straight at Beckman.
For a moment, Beckman stared into large blue green eyes framing a vertical black slit pupil. The alien’s eyes blinked horizontally, rather than vertically, with a thin translucent inner sheath and a thick outer layer of skin working together. Her mouth opened slightly, almost the equivalent of a gasp of surprise as the suit warned that seven hot blooded contacts were closing. Instinctively, she hurled the damaged transport cell at the nearest threat. The heavy lift suit multiplied her strength many times, turning the cell into a deadly projectile.
Beckman and Markus leapt back just before the cell crashed into the mound they’d been standing on. Multiple clicks sounded behind him as the team readied weapons, expecting the suited figure to come charging at him, then they heard a distant crunching sound.
It’s running! Beckman realized, jumping to his feet and scrambling back to the top of the mound.
The heavy lift suit leapt into the air and made a propulsion field assisted jump across half a kilometer of wreckage. Markus clambered up beside Beckman as the heavy lift suit vanished behind a pile of debris near the far wall. A moment later, a metallic clang rang through the chamber as a small access door slammed shut.
“Not very sociable, are they,” Beckman said.
“We should get out of here.” Markus said, wary of being trapped.
Beckman jumped down from the mound. “Let’s move!” He ordered, already running toward the end of the chamber.
They ran along silvery slag tracks between mounds of twisted honeycomb structures, close enough to support each other, with Nuke in the middle, and Markus staying close to the torpedo Nuke carried.
“Anyone see an exit?” Beckman yelled as they approached the far wall.
There were at least a dozen blast doors evenly spaced along the far wall, all closed. Beckman was about to give the order to fall back to the last hull breach when Xeno called out from the right.
“That one’s open!” She pointed to the second last door. At first glance, it appeared to be closed, but the bottom was obscured by debris, concealing a meter high opening near the deck.
“Incoming,” Tucker called as he raised his special. “Six o’clock.”
Two spinning top shaped trackers floated down through a hull breach in the ceiling. They’d barely cleared the opening when three weaponized seekers flashed past them, free falling into the chamber. Each seeker was equipped with a pair of short cannons where their upper arms should have been. The upper section rotated as before, only now to aim weapons. In their lower arms, the seekers carried miniature disk-shaped copies of the battloid’s shield emitters.
Tucker fired at one of the trackers. The open space above the scrap metal filled chamber allowed Conan’s intelligent aiming system to lock onto its target. The blast caught the tracker squarely, illuminating its ovoidal shield which sparked on the brink of collapse.
Not as tough as the thing at the mine, Beckman realized, but too many to fight! “Run!” he shouted as he started toward Xeno’s blast door.
They sprinted as one, keeping formation around Nuke, even as they scrambled over piles of debris. Nuke ran straight for the exit, not looking back, relying on the others to cover him and listening for the order to detonate. If Beckman went down, that would be the same as an order to trigger the device. The others fired as they ran, using a mix of specials and M16s, forcing the faster seekers to take evasive action.
The large trackers landed on the chamber floor and began gliding toward them above the piles of twisted metal, while the faster seekers spread out, leaping from one mound to the next, keeping low to avoid the team’s suppressing fire. They fired their twin cannons when they were airborne, and again when they landed on the mounds, but they never got a clear shot.
Beckman fired at the nearest seeker, then glanced at Markus. “Do they look helpless to you?”
“They look desperate!” Markus replied as he fired a burst from his sub machine gun.
Virus spotted a seeker leap toward a mound to his right. He fired a grenade from his launcher into the wreckage, which exploded as the seeker landed, burying it. A moment later, Virus jumped clear as one of the trackers fired its cannons, blowing apart the mound he’d been stan
ding on.
Nuke reached the blast door, finding it pried open by an emergency jack put in place during the initial rescue operation. Without slowing, he rolled under the blast door into a short corridor, then ran on several meters before opening his pack and connecting the GE power supply. “The package is hot,” He radioed with his finger over the detonator button.
“Standby,” Beckman yelled, running toward the blast door.
Xeno rolled under the blast door and took up a covering position on the far side. Virus stumbled weakly, and fell. Markus hesitated, then rolled under the door, leaving Virus to his fate. On the other side of the door, Markus spotted the emergency jack holding the blast door open. He considered blasting it, trapping Beckman, Tucker and Virus on the other side, but Xeno was kneeling behind him, covering the base of the door with her M16. She’d see everything.
“Back here, Markus,” Xeno yelled.
Looking down the barrel of her assault rifle, he moved back to her position. He knelt, aiming for the gap beneath the blast door, but watching Nuke with his finger over the detonator button. If the order came to blow the ship, Markus was ready to shoot the young lieutenant before he could detonate the warhead.
Outside the blast door, Tucker stopped and aimed at a seeker leaping on a low, fast trajectory to the left. The armed reconnaissance machine raised one of its mini shields as Conan fired. The blast caught the edge of the shield, but still cut the slender machine in two. Tucker then turned and ran again, as the seeker Virus had buried pushed wreckage aside, and leapt into the air.
Beckman caught Virus by the shoulder and pushed him under the blast door. Virus crawled weakly through as Tucker sprinted the last few meters. To their right, the third seeker leapt forward, rotating its twin cannons towards them, but Beckman and Tucker rolled under the blast door together as it fired. When Beckman saw the jack supporting the blast door, he pulled the pin on a grenade and placed it on the squat machine as the first seeker landed on the other side.
“Fire in the hole!” he yelled as he and Tucker raced away from the door jack.
Everyone in the corridor fell back as the seeker outside crawled under the blast door. When it was half way through, the grenade exploded. The door jack folded and the blast door crashed down on top of the seeker, crushing it. Beckman expected to hear the machines outside blasting the door, but there was only silence. They knew their weapons were no match for the super dense armor.
Beckman turned to Nuke. “Stand down.”
Nuke disconnected the power pack from the detonator. “Package disarmed.”
Relief swept across the faces in the corridor.
“We cut that close,” Virus said.
“I’ve seen closer,” Tucker said, unimpressed.
The tiny speakers in their ears sounded with a voice distorted by static. “Nuke, is that you?”
They all exchanged surprised looks as they recognized the voice of someone they thought dead.
“Vamp, this is Beckman. Report.”
“I’m with Timer and Dr McInness, sir. We’ve got the ship’s schematic. Can you identify your position?
“We just came through a blast door on the north side of a huge room, several kilometers long.”
“It was the second door from the eastern wall,” Xeno added.
There was a long silence before Vamp spoke again. “Got it. We’re about thirty levels above you, and half a kilometer north. Follow the corridor you’re in. I’ll talk you up.”
“Affirmative.”
“Hurry, Major. There’s something up here you’ve got to see.”
* * * *
For the first time since they’d started, Laura saw the ridge ahead, rising above the forested plateau. It overlooked the Walker River, east of Parson’s Range, and provided clear line of sight to the shield dome towers.
Another hour or two, she thought, anguished by the knowledge that if they succeeded, it would mean her husband’s death.
They’d been moving fast, with Liyakindirr in the lead, carrying the short wave radio and guiding them along a narrow track that was invisible until they were upon it. Behind her, Hooper limped steadfastly on, holding his fatboy special in his left hand while his blackened right arm hung limply by his side. Sweat dripped from his pallid face, but his innate fitness and the painkillers he swallowed every few hours kept him going. Bandaka’s wife and daughter followed Hooper, moving effortlessly through the forest in the oppressive heat, keeping an eye on the sergeant in case he faltered, while old Mulmulpa brought up the rear.
Liyakindirr stopped for the first time and tilted his head, listening. He turned and yelled urgently in Yolngu, then Djapilawuy and Mapuruma ran into the bush while old Mulmulpa ambled off in a different direction at a pace befitting his age.
Liyakindirr turned to Laura and Hooper. “They found us!”
Laura looked back, but saw nothing. She turned to ask Liyakindirr what he’d heard, but he’d already vanished into the bush, leaving the radio pack alone on the trail. Behind her, Hooper raised his special in his good left hand, turning slowly, scanning the trees.
“Hide,” he growled as he strained to hear what Liyakindirr had detected.
Laura drew the sidearm Xeno had given her, then took cover behind a tree. She waited, barely breathing, until a flash of sunlight reflecting off a polished silver surface caught her eye. Two silver blurs raced toward them through the trees, changing course every few seconds, crisscrossing back and forth across each other’s path.
A search pattern? Laura wondered.
When the seekers drew near, Laura heard the soft machine gun patter of their footsteps and the sound of green plants whipped aside by their metal bodies. She realized these seekers were different to the ones they’d seen before. Their top arm sections had been replaced by twin weapon mounts and their lower arms carried small shield emitters. When they spotted Hooper standing alone on the trail, going down on one knee to aim his special, they scanned him quickly, instantly recognizing the recovered weapon in his hand. They knew the weapon’s strengths and how to exploit its weaknesses. Seeing he was about to fire, they darted sideways at high speed, circling Hooper in opposite directions. Hooper touched the fatboy’s firing surface, then waited as the weapon tried to lock onto its target. It pushed against his hand, inertially correcting his aim, then correcting again and again, unable to fire while the seeker moved at a velocity and angle calculated to prevent it from gaining a lock.
They’re faster than the targeting system! Hooper realized.
He tried aiming ahead of one seeker, but the weapon’s auto targeting system fought against him, refusing to fire, dragging his hand back. There was a way to disable the inertial target locking system, but the Groom Lake brainiacs had failed to discover it.
“God damn it!” Hooper growled as he dropped the fatboy and drew his big .50 caliber pistol. He sighted on the nearest seeker and fired. The seeker’s small shield flashed as the heavy slug glanced off it, causing the machine to veer away into the trees as it realized it was under attack from a different kind of weapon. Hooper spun around, caught sight of the second seeker as it turned sharply toward him. He aimed carefully and fired another heavy slug which flashed as it struck the shield. Electrical force lines radiated outwards from the impact point as the shield, meant to absorb energy blasts rather than projectiles, strained under the kinetic impact of the massive slug.
The seeker squirted a mass of dark red nano machines at Hooper’s pistol from one of its shield arms, then sped into the trees to give its shield time to regenerate. The red nano stream flew through the air towards him, but he dived sideways avoiding it, groaning as his burned right side hit the ground. The weaponized nano machines struck a tree behind him, swarmed hungrily into the trunk emitting wisps of gray smoke as they disassembled its molecular structure. The truck broke with a loud crack, then crashed down through the forest to Hooper’s left. The red nano machines ate down through the stump, into the roots, until they’d dug a hole so deep, they we
re deprived of light and morphed into red ooze.
The first seeker doubled back. When it saw Hooper on the ground, it came to an instant stop, rotating its twin cannons toward him and separating its shields for a clear line of sight. A moment before it fired, a wooden spear shot out of the bushes and struck the armor protecting its torso’s thin metal skin. The spear broke in two, but the impact knocked the armored seeker off balance, causing its blast to flash over Hooper’s head. It righted itself and rotated its cannons back along the spear’s trajectory in a single fluid motion, before unleashing a sustained raking fire into the forest. It cut down trees and bushes alike, but found it was blasting only shadows. Hooper fired from the ground, his heavy slug passing through the gap in the seeker’s shields and striking the machine just above its chest armor. Sparks flashed from its upper spinal joint, then its cannons began discharging randomly.
Was that its fire control? Hooper wondered.
Liyakindirr suddenly charged screaming from the bushes with his nulla nulla held high over his head. The heavy club was almost a meter long and tapered to a point below his hands. The seeker’s three hundred and sixty degree sensor scan saw him approach, but failed to detect any weapon. To its artificial mind, Liyakindirr lacked even the primitive kinetic weapon its other adversary carried. The seeker’s designers, for all their genius, had never anticipated their machine would ever be engaged in single combat by a naked hunter-gatherer wielding a stone age club. The seeker, misunderstanding the attack, angled its shields towards Hooper as its twin cannons spun towards him in short jerking movements, randomly blasting the foliage. At the same moment, Liyakindirr leapt forward, bringing his nulla nulla crashing down onto the seeker’s sensor disk, shattering it.
The Mothership Page 32
