The Nightshade Problem: Sol Space Volume Two

by James Wilks

  “Charis, listen to me.” Staples’ voice conveyed a calm she did not feel. She pushed her emotions down and spoke as soothingly as she could. “We’re not leaving our crew members. This isn’t a numbers game. Sacrificing them to save ourselves doesn’t win us this situation.”

  “Win!” Charis yelled desperately. “We’re not trying to win, we’re trying to survive!”

  Staples continued, trying her best to appear unperturbed. “If we run, we’re dead anyway. We can’t out-fly those things; we know that. The only chance we have is to get Brutus back on board so they won’t launch tac missiles at us.”

  “Don,” Charis pleaded, her eyes bloodshot and full of tears. He shook his head morosely. She turned and appealed to the pilot beside her. “Bethany, please. Get us out of here. That ship’s only fifteen minutes away, and they’re going to kill my baby.”

  Bethany turned and looked at her with mascara-covered eyes full of regret. “I’m sorry,” she whispered, and took her hands off the controls in front of her.

  “Hey,” Templeton said, pushing off his safety restraint and gliding across the room to Charis. Staples fought and mastered the urge to tell him to buckle up again. She needed their navigator functional if they had any hope of getting out of this, though she wondered just how much of a fool’s hope that was. Templeton reached the chair, steadied himself, and put a calming hand on Charis’ shoulder. “They’ll make it. We’ll make it.”

  Charis sucked in two shuddering breaths, and a few tears floated from her eyes into the cockpit, but she nodded to the first mate. Staples thought she could see the woman stepping back from the edge of fear-induced madness, and she sighed in relief. Templeton turned to the captain, raised his bushy eyebrows, and mouthed a single word question. “Dinah?”

  The upper corner of the door into the workroom in which they waited bent inwards. Behind it was darkness. Overton pointed his rifle at the hole, but there was nothing to see. The silent banging of the robotic fists on the other side of the door had buckled the entire piece of metal inward, and Evelyn was amazed that it had not given way already.

  The other top corner bent in, and this time Overton aimed and fired blindly into the newly created hole. There was no sound accompanying the shot and no way to tell if the bullet had connected with anything in the hallway beyond. They stood stock-still, their breathing echoing through their helmets, two men with raised rifles pointed at a rapidly deteriorating door. Evelyn stood behind them, her breathing just as fast if not faster, alternatively wishing that she had brought a rifle and simply wanting to curl up in the corner until all of this went away. She looked at the bodies around her again, and thought that in another minute there would be one more dead computer scientist in this tomb.

  Brutus stood against the far wall next to the door, ready to ambush the automatons when they entered. The rational part of Evelyn’s mind that was not crowded out by adrenaline wondered whether sentience would provide an advantage in a droid death match. Before she could consider the problem further, the door burst open and three blue and white automaton forms, barely distinguishable from Brutus save for their color, entered the room.

  Overton opened fire, but Jang’s weapon refused to discharge. Despite the fact that the rifles were capable of firing in airless space, it was not quite fifty degrees above absolute zero. The rifle jammed in the cold, perhaps the victim of frozen gun-oil. The fact that Jang’s weapon malfunctioned was less a matter of bad luck than it was a statistical anomaly that Overton’s worked. He had thirty rounds.

  Though Carl Overton had been out of the military for close to a decade, much of the old training had stayed with him. In the face of three murderous robots, most people would have held the trigger and released it only when they had either eliminated the threat or emptied the magazine. Overton fired in short controlled bursts. The first of these hit the lead robot in the arm, the second in the leg, and the third in the torso. The bullets shredded the plastic and metal shells, and the air was almost immediately filled with tiny pieces of robotic debris bouncing off walls, workstations, and cadavers, all in unsettling silence.

  As the first of their attackers disintegrated under the deluge of bullets, the second grabbed a section of torso, used it as a shield, and surged forward on magnetic feet. The third robot climbed through the doorway, spider-like and impossibly fast, and launched itself directly at the three humans in the room. It had closed the distance by half when Brutus, who had pushed himself off the rear wall, collided with it and the two spun off against a bank of workstations as each sought to gain enough purchase to tear the other to pieces. Somewhere in the chaos Evelyn was aware of Templeton’s voice on the coms channel calling for Dinah, but she paid it little mind.

  Overton trained his rifle on the second robot, the one still charging behind the segment of its destroyed companion. He lowered his rifle slightly and took aim at the legs. Beside him, Jang cast the useless rifle aside and drew a large knife from behind his back. It was serrated and the blade was nearly twenty-five centimeters in length. A formidable weapon, Evelyn thought, until she looked at the machines intent on killing them. Given the situation, she thought that Jang might as well be wielding a butter knife.

  Overton fired at the legs, and the rounds ripped them to pieces as they hit. This did not arrest the forward movement of the robot. Now legless, it continued to sail through the room, cutting the distance. Its trajectory had changed, however, and it silently struck the ceiling. In a second it had cast aside the piece of the first robot, attached magnetic fingers to the ceiling, righted itself, and began crawling rapidly towards them. It moved like a fast-motion zombie Evelyn had seen in a movie once, a creature cut in half and still coming, single-minded in purpose.

  Three meters away, the third robot and Brutus tore at each other, each vying for position to inflict a killing blow. The robot seemed to gain the advantage for a second and clamped its hand over Brutus’ arm. Evelyn gasped as the hostile robot bent the arm back at the elbow, then tore it free altogether. It lifted the appendage overhead, wielding it like a club, and it was about to bring it down into the Brutus’ faceplate when Overton turned quickly and put his remaining three rounds through the thing’s chest. It still struggled feebly, and Brutus extended his leg to the nearby wall. His footpad magnetized, and once he had purchase, he grabbed the robot by the head and slammed its face into the wall repeatedly.

  Meanwhile, the half-robot still crawled across the ceiling towards them. Overton aimed and squeezed the trigger, but the clip was dry. He threw the rifle at it, but it dodged easily, slinking to the side like a snake. Evelyn backpedaled. The thing was a scant two meters away. It launched itself down at the two men, and she knew as sure as she knew that she could not breathe in space that if it got a single hand on one of them they were dead. It would tear a dozen holes in their EVA suits before Jang could stab it twice.

  Jang did not wait for that to happen. Once the robot had pushed itself from the ceiling and was no longer able to alter its trajectory, he threw the knife at it. The long serrated blade struck it straight in the face, and Overton and the security chief were just able to dodge to either side before the flailing form struck the flooring and bounced off, scrabbling blindly for some grip. Evelyn had to move out of its way as well, but it was dying now, the knife embedded firmly in its face. The hands spun about without any real volition, and a moment later it ceased to move altogether.

  The entire battle had been in silence, but the roaring of her blood in her ears and the fear that propelled her had filled her head. Now that it was over, Evelyn was again aware of the eerie quiet. She looked at the two men through the haze of robotic debris that now filled the room. Each had managed to find their magnetized feet again after leaping out of the path of danger. Brutus stood, still attached to the far wall at an unsettling perpendicular angle. In one arm he held the severed remains of his other, and he was looking up, from his perspective, at her.

  “I’m afraid there are more,” he said. Evelyn looke
d down the hall through the bent and useless door, and she could indeed see three more of them scrabbling down the dim hallway, each clinging to a different surface. Despair overwhelmed her, and she knew that she was going to die.

  “Captain,” Jang’s morose voice came over the coms. “I think you’re going to have to leave us. There are three more of Victor’s automatons on the way, and we’ve no weapons left.” Even as he spoke, he walked over to the now still corpse of the third robot and retrieved his knife. “None that will help, anyway.”

  Overton quickly crossed to the door and tried to close it, but it was so badly bent out of shape that he couldn’t get it to move. Evelyn knew that it would never lock. Beyond Overton’s form she could see the three new aggressors closing. She thought they had perhaps thirty seconds. She glanced at the other door in the room, but she understood why Jang and Overton weren’t already moving for it. A locked door would buy them only a few seconds, and there was little point in fleeing further into the base. She watched the three forms glide silently down the hallway and did her best to prepare herself for death.

  Staples’ voice came through the coms channel. “I… can’t accept that. We’re coming to get you.”

  They were fifteen yards away.

  “There’s no point, Captain,” Jang replied evenly. “We’ll be dead in less than a minute.”

  Ten yards.

  Staples voice was pleading now, begging Jang for some different answer. “Isn’t there something that you can-”

  “Clear line of fire!” Despite coming through coms, Dinah’s voice was unmistakable. As she spoke, one of the three robots shattered into pieces.

  Overton stepped to the side to clear the doorway, and Evelyn moved as well. Just as she did so, she caught sight of movement at the end of the hallway behind the two remaining robots. It was one of the suits of powered armor, and it was firing a massive rifle at their attackers. The second of the new robots blew to pieces under the hail of bullets, and the last one remaining turned and launched itself back down the hallway towards their would-be savior. Before it could get a grip and rip the armor apart, another burst of automatic fire tore its head off.

  A moment later the suit waded through the robotic detritus and into the room with the four crew members. The visor was up, and they could clearly see Dinah’s face in the gunmetal grey armor. Evelyn spotted a hastily placed patch of duct tape on the neck joint of the suit, but apart from that and some scuffing, it seemed undamaged.

  Evelyn’s first impulse was to rush forward and thank the woman, but then she caught sight of the corpses still floating in the room in the corner of her eye. Instead, she managed to stammer an awkward “Thank you.” If Dinah was offended by their lack of appreciation for saving their lives, she did not show it.

  “What’s going on down there?” Templeton demanded.

  “Everyone’s fine, sir,” Dinah replied. “We’re on our way out.”

  “Thank God,” Templeton said. “You’ve got to hurry. We’ve got another one of those ships heading for us. They’ll be in weapons range in less than ten minutes.”

  Brutus shook his head. “We won’t make it.”

  “Sorry?” Evelyn asked.

  “There are half a dozen more automatons headed here from deeper in the base.” He indicated the rear door to the room.

  “Then let’s get moving!” Jang said. He pushed off for the damaged door. Overton waited for Evelyn to get through as fast as she could, then followed her. Brutus came behind them, still holding his severed appendage. Dinah did not follow them.

  As the four of them sailed down the hallway and back to the hole in the ceiling the wreckage had created, Overton noticed the engineer’s absence and said, “Dinah, what are you doing? Come on.”

  “I can’t. They’re here. I’m engaging.”

  Evelyn saw that they were coming up on a corner. “What are we doing?” she asked desperately. “We can’t just leave her.”

  “We’ve got nothing to fight with,” Jang answered.

  “You need to go. Now.” Dinah’s voice was strained in their helmets. “I don’t know how long I can buy you. The ship can’t leave,” her voice stopped for a moment. The four of them took the corner, one after the other, and the ruined ceiling came into sight. “Until Brutus is onboard. Get him there. He’s your shield.”

  “Dinah’s right,” Templeton said. “If she bought you a minute, don’t waste it.”

  “Goddamn it,” Overton swore. “Dinah, please-”

  “Save it,” Dinah’s voice was tense. “I’m not-” her voice cut out.

  Evelyn felt disconnected from everything around her. There was an enemy ship bearing down on Gringolet, but she couldn’t see it. A woman was fighting desperately to save their lives, but she couldn’t see or hear that either. There was nothing around her but the coldly quiet hallway, the two men and the robot, and the starlit space beyond the hole.

  When Jang reached the breach in the ceiling, he used his jetpack to change his attitude and push himself up through it. Brutus was right behind him, and the robot leapt upwards, drifting out into space. Jang caught him by the leg, then used his other hand to work the controls to the jetpack and began to guide them back to the ship. Evelyn brought herself up short at the wreckage, the power suited bodies still floating around her.

  Overton stopped as well. “You guys go, I’m going back,” he said.

  She put a restraining hand on his arm. “You can’t help her, Carl,” she said.

  “She’s right,” Templeton’s voice came through their helmets. “We just lost the feed from Dinah’s suit. It’s got to be non-functioning.”

  “And they’ll still be coming,” Evelyn warned. She tugged at him lightly. “We have to go. They’re waiting for us.”

  Overton gritted his teeth and looked down the hallway for a few seconds, then nodded and extended the short tether to her belt. A few seconds later they were free of the base and on the way to Gringolet.

  “I want to know the second everyone’s onboard,” Templeton said into the coms panel next to him. He switched to shipwide coms. “We’ve got a ship bearing down on us. Everyone strap in right away. Prepare for some choppy flying.” He looked over at his captain. “Who’s going to take the tactical station?”

  The question made her pause. She couldn’t quite believe what was happening. She didn’t know whether they could escape this time, but that concern barely registered with her at the moment. She had come to rely on Dinah for so much, she almost didn’t know what to do without her. John could run the ReC quite capably, but Dinah was by far their best tactical officer.

  She keyed her watch. “Brutus, can you handle the tactical station?”

  “Ordinarily yes, Captain, but I’m afraid I have sustained an injury. Until I am repaired-”

  “I’ll do it,” Jang’s voice interrupted him. “We’ll be onboard in thirty seconds.”

  “Then get up here as fast as you can,” she said, and tapped her watch again. She looked at her pilot. “Bethany, I want us moving as soon as the airlock is closed, but take it easy. We need to give them time to strap in and Jang time to get up here. Once everyone’s secured, you can punch it.”

  “Yes, sir,” Bethany said, and her emulation of their absent crew member made Staples’ heart ache.

  Two minutes later they were moving at nearly a full gravity of acceleration. Kojo Jang pulled himself up into the cockpit, then crossed the back wall and climbed up into the tactical chair. He was still wearing his EVA suit, though he had doffed his gloves and helmet. As soon as he was secure, Bethany entered some commands and the ship surged forward at over two Gs. The uncomfortable pressure of high gravity settled over them, pressing their hair to their heads and their backs into their seats. Staples remembered the new chairs, and adjusted the gel to make herself more comfortable. Another switch brought the neck braces out of her headrest. They were immediately useful as Bethany banked and spun the ship to avoid an asteroid in their path.

  “What’
s our updated intercept time?” Staples asked her navigator.

  “Six minutes, thirty-three seconds,” Charis answered. Her previous hysteria seemed to have subsided. Despite the desperate situation they were in, she was at her best when doing her job.

  “We’ve got to go back for Dinah, whether she’s… either way, we’ve got to go back,” Templeton said.

  “We will, Don,” Staples answered. “But we’ve got to deal with this right now.”

  “We left the UteV behind,” Jang said as he worked to reacquaint himself with the tactical controls. “If she survived the attack, she can use that to extend her life support.”

  “What happened to her?” Templeton asked. “She said she was going to look after her crew. I thought she meant she was going to try to bring their bodies onboard for a proper burial or something, despite what the captain said.”

  “Best guess is she extracted one to the UteV, pulled it inside, and pressurized the chamber. She must have,” Jang paused for a moment while he calibrated the targeting display in front of him. “She must have patched it, pulled out the body, then put on the armor. Would have been a tight fit in there.”

  Staples thought about the small UteV, scarcely four meters in length. The image of opening a suit of power armor, removing the frozen body of an old comrade, and climbing into his bloody armor was claustrophobic and disturbing.

  “That woman,” Staples muttered. “She can’t be dead,” she said matter-of-factly. “It’s just… impossible.”

  Templeton looked at her sympathetically, his bushy brows drawn together. “Captain, we lost her signal.”

  “I know. I just can’t believe it.”

  The pressure on their bodies shifted as Bethany took another curve around a large asteroid.

  “Captain,” Charis cautioned. “The faster we go, the more dangerous this is going to get. Lots of these asteroids are small, and if we run into one of them going fast enough, it’ll go right through us.” As if to buttress her point, there was the audible clang of a small rock bouncing off the hull.