Defiance

by Bear Ross

  DEFIANCE

  ©2019 BEAR ROSS

  This book is protected under the copyright laws of the United States of America. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser. Any reproduction or unauthorized use of the material or artwork contained herein is prohibited without the express written permission of the authors.

  Print and eBook formatting, and cover design by Steve Beaulieu.

  Published by Aethon Books LLC. 2019

  All characters in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  All rights reserved.

  Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62

  Chapter 63

  Chapter 64

  Chapter 65

  Chapter 66

  FROM THE PUBLISHER

  Bear's Writing Notes, Meanderings, And Gratitudes

  About the Author

  To Beautiful Rachel, my patient wife, who keeps me sane.

  I know it's not easy, Gorgeous.

  To my mom, Louise, who kept the book shelves of our

  home well-stocked with Niven and Pournelle novels,

  and who gifted her tall, odd son with a love for the library.

  Thank You.

  Prologue

  WELCOME TO JUNCTIONWORLD

  In the gap between worlds, where the timeless present melds with both the past and future, there exists a place called Junctionworld. It is an interdimensional crossroads, a dark, disk-shaped city nearly one hundred miles across where thousands, perhaps millions, of distinct realities intersect via the Worldgates.

  The Worldgates themselves are eight monolithic shapes, some formed like swirling vortexes, others like octagons or inverted triangles. Regardless of their configuration, each stands over a mile high and wide, and are spaced around the Junctionworld’s urban perimeter. No written history can tell who built the towering interdimensional structures, only that they provide the pathways to invasion, conquest, trade, and terror.

  Each Worldgate emits a different pattern of bright, swirling light, bathing the zones around them in their own distinct flavors of illumination. As distance from the gates increases, the colors fade away to the gray, swirling skies that loom over the rest of the dreary pocket dimension.

  Control of these portals lies in the hands, if they can be called that, of the Gatekeepers. This powerful race of conquerors regulates and taxes all trade and traffic passing through the giant glowing gates.

  The Gatekeepers, ruled by a council of eight GateLords, are polite to a fault, administering Junctionworld through adherence to their rigid, arcane laws known as the Old Code.

  The armored overbeings keep the teeming masses of a thousand races pacified with mechanized blood-sports, catering to their baser needs in giant arenas of steel. The Gatekeepers pit sentient pilots against each other in hulking suits of walking armor known as mechs.

  These gladiatorial battles, especially those fought to the death, are recorded by the Gatekeepers for broadcast. These transmissions flow back to Central Data, the mile-high tower standing at the hub of the wheel-shaped city. Central Data is the GateLords’ palace and fortress, but also their network headquarters. From that bristling spire, the arena sportscasts are sent through the Worldgates as entertainment fodder for a million up-stream worlds.

  When the arenas fail to keep the restless population distracted, the Gatekeepers send in their Enforcement Directorate troopers. These soldier-slaves, formed in giant, organic printers, are known by their ancient manufacturing brand, the Model Nines. The Nines are backed by their own combat mechs and armadas of hovering drones.

  Should the Nines falter, though, the tower of Central Data stands ready as a final option, bristling in nuclear and conventional weaponry. Together, they stand ever-ready to crush rebel and invader alike in defense of the Gatekeepers.

  The mech gladiators, even those that survive their first handful of matches, are taxed and levied to the point of near-slavery by the Gatekeepers. Their life-debt, the cost of rescuing them from danger in their old home dimensions, is used as leverage to keep the armor pilots fighting and producing content for the networks.

  Only one being, a human named Solomon Kramer, has ever managed to win his liberty from the interdimensional overlords using his combat skills, raw determination, and the Gatekeepers’ own tactics against them. If there is one thing the GateLords and their underlings will not tolerate, it is the embarrassment of being bested at their own game.

  The Gatekeepers’ thirst for dominance demands that they grind down Kramer and his family, while their Old Code restricts the manner in which they do it. Their goal is to extinguish the legacy of those that would dare defy them, lest it inspire others to question their power.

  The irritating need for freedom must be crushed.

  Chapter One

  JUNCTIONWORLD

  SIXTH WORLDGATE ZONE

  BERVA PROXIMA ARENA

  Jered Kramer squinted as the harsh artificial sunlight poured through his walking armor’s thick, semi-transparent canopy.

  “All systems online, Jered,” the mech's battle computer said. “My weapons and propulsion systems are nominal, and all secondary systems report in the green. I am ready to fight ‘For Our Freedom, And Yours.’”

  “Eh, that’s my dad’s old line, Judah,” replied the mech's pilot, Jered Kramer. “Sounds good, though. You and I need to come up with something of our own. Confirm, diagnostics read green across the board. Let's go get some.”

  “Agreed, Pilot. Let's 'get some,'” the smooth robotic voice said, over-accentuating the words. “Your father also liked that phrase.”

  “Yeah, that’s probably where I got it,” Jared said as he flipped a bank of switches. “I kinda wish dad was here to see me, now, even if he hates this place.”

  “An understatement, pilot,” Judah said. �
��The word ‘hate’ only begins to describe your father’s opinion of Berva Proxima arena and the Gatekeeper charged with its management.”

  Jered and his walking armored mech, Judah, stepped through the grand archway of the arena. The roar of the teeming alien crowd swelled as the huge colosseum’s lights focused on him and his towering armor.

  “No doubt, Judah,” Jered said, grinning at the thought of his angry father. “All the Gatekeepers hate Dad, but he and Mikralos seem to have something extra special going on between them.”

  “Agreed, pilot,” Judah replied. “The particular fact that Honored Mikralos holds your contract of servitude, forcing you to defend this arena’s status, must wound Solomon Kramer deeply.”

  “Whoa, easy on the guilt-trip, you’re starting to sound like my mom,” Jered said. “Hey, who is this guy, anyway?”

  “Your opponent today is a fellow human,” Judah answered. “Masamune Kyuzo, piloting a customized Bernex Systems k-17.”

  “Human, huh? Wait, did you say a k-17?” Jered asked, smirking to himself. “Custom or not, who the void still steps into the arena in one of those old things? This is going to be too easy.”

  “This is his first Hammer League fight and his first death match, apparently, pilot. I have evaluated his previous, lower-league shield-matches, however, and there is a—” the machine said before Jered interrupted.

  “He’s just another notch, Judah. Fresh meat,” Jered said. “Don’t bother me with the details. This will be over, soon enough.”

  Jered looked out the sides of his cockpit at the carved, shot-pocked stones next to him. Elaborate flourishes engraved into the entrance showed battle scenes and the portraits of fabled mech gladiators who once fought here. Jered hoped to add his name and visage to the laser-carved portal someday, even if the place was just a bottom-tier dump and slaughterhouse. Today's victory would mean that they were half-way to freedom. Sorry, Masa-whatever-your-name-is. Nothing personal, Jered thought to himself.

  Jered finished his pre-fight ritual, tapping his chest straps four times and re-positioning the 2d photo of his two little sisters on the mech cockpit’s dashboard. He ran his fingers over Judah's control yokes, flipping off his weapons’ safeties as he eased Judah’s giant armored bulk into a slow, thundering jog.

  As quick as it started, the mech froze in its tracks, skidding to a halt. Frowning, he eased the control yokes forward again. Nothing.

  His weapons display panel remained red and black, large slashes appearing over icons of his cannon and chainsword. The safeties weren't disengaging.

  He hit them again, trying to bring the mech’s weapons online. Judah's control displays blacked out, then “error Control Module Compromised error” began flashing over and over in his heads-up display.

  Jered thumped the side of his cockpit's main electrical panel, jarring it open.

  “Gate damn it, not now, Judah!” he said.

  Without Kramer's say-so, retractable blast plates in his mech’s hull emerged, assembling themselves in an angular, protective shell that followed the canopy’s smooth shape. The interior of the command compartment grew dark, then lit up as the internal displays came online, mirroring the outside view through protected cameras. The extensive threat indicators and digital readout of the arena’s interior came up, but the normal control icons failed to appear.

  “Judah, what the void is going on?!” Jered yelled.

  Only the sound of hissing static answered his shouted question. Suddenly, Jered collided with the side of his cockpit as Judah lurched, unbidden, into motion. The thousand-species crowd roared as the combination of stoic Judah and helpless Jered stormed through the carved arch.

  Cursing, Jered Kramer smashed his fists bloody against the interior of the armored cockpit glass. He screamed his frustration to the dead control displays and the armored shell which prevented the arena's cameras from seeing his plight.

  The mech continued its plodding gait to the starting circle, about half-way to the center of the cavernous auditorium. The lights in the arena's high ceiling turned down to minimum illumination. Small camera drones flew in strangled orbits around Jered's armor, and the main spotlight in the armored camera turret flooded over them from above.

  The ring announcer's voice boomed an introduction in a number of alien tongues and data streams as Jered continued to thrash at Judah's controls to no avail.

  Judah came to a lumbering stop in the floodlit ring of the engagement point, facing the maddened crowd. The walking armor was now in autonomous mode, but the external lights that normally would have signaled that condition were not flashing.

  To Jered's horror, the mech drew its large chain-saw sword and pointed upwards in a salute to Gatekeeper Mikralos, the proprietor of Berva Proxima arena. The motorized close-combat weapon, the pride of his father's armory, was longer than a full-size hovercar and drew its brutal cutting power directly from the mech's fusion turbine.

  The challenger, in a red and white mech bristling with cannon and missile launchers, did the same with the power claw on its left arm.

  The Gatekeeper's viewing box, an armored bubble high above the stadium seats, flashed answering lights in acknowledgment, returning the salutes.

  A strobing white pulse from every light in the massive building signaled the start of the match. Jered pulled the ejection handles on either side of his headrest. Again, nothing. The artificial sunlight of the stadium returned to its normal illumination. Horns and sirens sounded the start of the death match, and Jered moaned, though no one could hear his dread.

  Combat was now joined, and Kramer’s screens flashed telltale alerts as the opposing pilot boosted his mech's jets hard for cover. The red mech shot behind one of the scattered clusters of large granite rocks dotting the mile-wide floor. Small exhaust plumes flowered bright yellow from launch tubes on the enemy mech's armored back as it made its initial move, each flash signaling the launch of a guided warhead.

  Judah, still not under Jered's control, sidestepped behind hard cover the instant before impact. The missiles tracked into the face of the twenty-foot-tall wall barricades the towering mech sheltered behind. Sharp explosions thundered, their echoes cascading from the walls and audience shields. A half-dozen glowing spots appeared on the side of the wall facing him, the result of shaped charges that came just short of drilling through the two-foot-thick edifices.

  Jered bellowed in fear and rage, yanking and bucking against his controls. The faithful armor which had borne his father into conflict for years continued to rebel. The anti-sabotage checks were supposed to keep dung like this from happening, he thought. Prath, if I live through this, you're a dead ape.

  Crew Chief Prath would have to wait, though. Jered's hijacked mech popped exhaust nozzles from compartments in its lower legs, and Kramer could hear the microturbines begin to spool up in Judah's large backpack-like dorsal housing.

  “No, no, Judah, what the void are you doing?” Jered cried. “This is suicide! Hard boost this early? We'll be sitting puddleflaps! This is a gate-damned nightmare!”

  “Je-red... This. Not... not... Me... >bzzt< Interior Overri-” Judah's audio speaker managed to say in jerking tones between bursts of garbled electronic gibberish.

  “Judah! Judah, initiate control system purge!” Jered said, screaming to his console. “Blow the main reactor manifold bolts! Vent it! Vent it all!”

  Jered and Judah were now roaring across the steel deck of the Berva Proxima arena, dodging incoming bursts of autocannon fire and swirling missile volleys with graceful ease. The sports network’s drone cameras were hard-pressed to keep up with the jinking and maneuvering, and the jolting acceleration forced Jered to push his arms back through his seat's restraints. The enemy mech loomed, the distance closing.

  Judah's giant chainsword began spinning up, the whining keen adding to the flood of noise coming from the turbines. Jered felt the armor's weight shift, leaning in for a final assault. Reflex made him manipulate the dead controls, but it was to no avail.
The massive combat robot's feet threw sparks as it slid across the arena’s steel floor. Its feet caught momentary purchase, and the killing machine rolled into a headlong controlled tumble. With a fearful blur of movement, its giant sword was now arcing overhead, as if to cleave the opposing mech-gladiator's armor in two.

  But the jets cut out short. Jered saw the distance was too far to engage in close combat. His armor began a stiff, overdone display of hacking and parrying at the air, fighting an opponent who was still far off, as it continued to charge on foot.

  The enemy red and white mech brought its main gun to bear. There were no rocks, there was no barricade, no protective cover at all. Fatal ground, as the old man would say, Jered Kramer thought.

  Time slowed. Jered could almost see down the cannon’s barrel at the shell waiting to be fired. The muzzle looked like a water pipe a construction crew installed near the family compound when he was a kid. The picture on his dashboard, the one with his two kid sisters, rattled loose from all the maneuvering. His mech's furious, useless charge continued unabated.