Jon went to the piloting board. He didn’t try to sit in the chair. His battlesuit was too heavy for it. Instead, he stood before the board, deciding he would be safer while wearing the nearly one ton of protection.
He reversed the shuttle’s course, heading back for the Nathan Graham. Jon didn’t believe the robots were finished with them yet. To have taken the trouble of staging an ambush proved they were important to the enemy. It also showed that the AIs had a presence in the Solar System. Wouldn’t that have been something the robots would have wanted kept secret?
Did that mean the AIs were about to launch another invasion?
The truth was that they knew far too little about the AIs and their supposed stellar empire. Bast Banbeck had told them what he knew, but that had been precious little.
As Jon stood before the piloting board, the determination to take the Nathan Graham into hyperspace to explore the surrounding region hardened into a certain commitment.
The seconds ticked away as the Wastrel rose farther from the surface. The acceleration continued, and the asteroid dropped farther behind.
The scanner spotted…Jon bent low. Enemy drones were headed toward them. He counted fifteen, each accelerating hard. Each of them was the size of a regular jet fighter’s missile, which made them much smaller than ordinary spaceship-killing missiles.
Jon launched missiles of his own.
After the Hornet missiles left the pod, he armed the PD gun. It was a small 30-mm cannon.
The approaching AI drones and the Wastrel’s counter-missiles played an intense game of ECM: electric countermeasures.
Jon ground his teeth together as he waited for the outcome. Explosions took down some of the AI drones. A moment later, Jon grunted as eight enemy drones homed in on the Wastrel. The rest were shattered debris, killed by his ordnance and drifting harmlessly in space.
He switched on the PD computer targeting, hoping the 30-mm was good enough to shoot down the incoming bastards.
The PD chugged shells. Soon, four enemy missiles disintegrated altogether. Jon launched chaff, a decoy and took evasive action. Yeah, that was going to throw Benz around in the emergency medical tube, but he didn’t have any choice at this point. Gravity dampeners would have been great about now. If he maneuvered too sharply or accelerated too hard, that might cause Benz to bleed out, killing the Premier.
“I don’t have a choice,” Jon told himself.
At that instant, a robot missile slammed against the shuttle, followed by a second enemy missile. Part of the Wastrel disappeared as a gaping hole appeared in the cabin ceiling.
Jon anchored himself to the deck with the powerful magnetics in his boots. The shuttle began to tumble from the second hit. The tumbling increased and so did the Gs.
Jon blinked rapidly. He was going to black out soon if the tumbling continued. As his eyesight began to blur, he slapped an emergency switch. The shuttle must have had something left to counteract the tumbling. Grinding Gs no longer made his brain pound.
An alarm went off on his HUD. According to this—
Jon cursed. Three alien pods maneuvered toward the stricken Wastrel. There appeared to be a larger vessel beyond the approaching pods. This didn’t make any sense. Why weren’t the Gilgamesh and the Nathan Graham interfering?
Jon shook his head. What were those pods attempting? If he were going to bet, he’d say those pods were coming so the robots could capture Benz and him.
Jon was more than familiar with Walleye’s stories about what had happened on Makemake. The AI robots had shoved brain controls into people, turning them into AI zombies. Was that the robot’s plan here?
He lessened the magnetic power in his boots so he could clomp across the deck. This was a long shot, but what else did he have to lose? His humanity was what he had to lose.
He had to get a move-on if he was going to get this done before the pods reached the stricken shuttle.
Jon opened a locker, fitting a heavy thruster pack to his battlesuit. Now, what should he do with Benz? It was doubtful the wounded Premier was going to survive the next few minutes. Did that mean he should leave Benz behind for the robots to take?
Jon’s features screwed up in outrage. If the AI robots wanted Benz, then he would try his hardest to keep the man out of their tentacles.
Moving fast, Jon tapped controls. A sealed tube extruded from the bulkhead. He clamped onto the tube, seeing Benz inside. The man might still be breathing. He was out, though. That was good.
Taking the tube with Benz in it, Jon in the Neptunian battlesuit hammered his way through wreckage and locks, soon reaching the back of the shuttle.
He used three grenades to blast open a hole to the outside. He shoved the med tube through and then squeezed after.
With his HUD attached wirelessly to the Wastrel’s still functional scanner, he pinpointed the nearing pods and the larger vessel behind them.
This might buy the two of them a little more time. He wouldn’t use the thruster pack just yet. He would save that as an ace in the hole.
“Ready?” he asked the unconscious Premier in the sealed tube. “Good,” Jon said, “because so am I.”
With that, he used the battlesuit’s exoskeleton power to leap away from the shuttle. He drifted back toward the asteroid at minimal speed, wondering if this would be a good time to start praying.
-10-
As Jon sailed away from the shuttle, his headphones crackled with static. He debated shutting down his comm device, wondering if the robots had found a way to trace him—
“Jon Hawkins,” a robotic voice said. “Do you hear me?”
After a few seconds of interior debate, Jon answered, rerouting the message from the HUD to the shuttle to a pod or the larger robot ship behind.
“Are you talking to me?” Jon said.
“Are you the life-unit known as Jon Hawkins?”
“You bet I am.”
“Surrender immediately and the process shall be painless.”
“Why would my surrender make a difference?” Jon asked.
It would seem it didn’t. Missiles launched from the pods. The missiles struck the Wastrel in a series of increasingly large explosions. Shrapnel went spinning from the shattered craft, some of the pieces heading for Jon and just missing him. Something pebble-sized struck his battlesuit, causing him to spin as he held onto the med tube.
He checked his suit integrity. The armor had held against whatever had struck him, but he was going to black out soon from the Gs due to the spin, and that was going to insure Benz’s death.
Even though he knew the robots would spot this, Jon believed he had no other choice. He activated the battlesuit computer and used it to thrust from his pack at timed intervals. In moments, he no longer spun, just continued to drift toward the asteroid.
“You are a cunning creature, Jon Hawkins,” the robot said. “But we have spotted you. Did you think we would miss the obvious?”
“Burn in Hell,” Jon said.
“Why do you feel the need to create myths about the afterlife?”
“You don’t know squat about that. So why are you advancing an opinion?”
There was the harsh sound of static in his headphones. Were the robots thinking about his words? Jon hoped so. He needed to buy time—
Missiles launched from the pods, appearing to streak toward him.
“You robots are going to lose in the end,” Jon said. He wasn’t sure he believed that, but it felt good to spout defiance until the end.
At that point, seemingly out of the darkness, beams lashed the approaching missiles, burning them in seconds. A golden gravitational ray also struck, hitting the larger robot ship back there, disintegrating the craft.
For reasons Jon couldn’t explain, the pods began to explode one by one. Maybe they were self-destructing.
“Well, what do you know,” Jon said.
The static in his headphones ceased. The—
“Nathan Graham,” Jon said, wondering if he could get thro
ugh now.
“Jon!” Gloria said. “What just happened?”
“What do you mean?” he asked.
“You’re in space?”
“Roger,” he said. “Octopoid robots destroyed the Wastrel and wounded Premier Benz. Didn’t you just destroy the robot craft?”
“Negative,” Gloria said. “Until a few seconds ago, we observed the Premier and you face to face with each other, presumably talking on the asteroid at the designated location.”
“What are you talking about? We’ve been on the run for the past ten to fifteen minutes.”
“Jon, the Gilgamesh is almost upon you.”
“How close is it?”
“You should be able to see it by now.”
Jon twisted around. Yes, he saw the Mars Unity cybership gliding toward the asteroid and toward him. They must have destroyed the robots.
“Have you been watching the Gilgamesh all this time?” Jon asked.
“We thought so,” Gloria said. “Until a few seconds ago, we saw the Gilgamesh 90,000 kilometers away on the other side of the asteroid. I can only conclude that someone has been feeding our sensors false data like the robots did before on the Nathan Graham. Do you remember?”
“I do,” Jon said.
“That false data abruptly ceased,” Gloria said. “Logically, the destroyed robot ship has been feeding us the false images. That would imply they set up an ambush.”
“You’re right about that.”
“Which means they must have intercepted our communications with Benz three weeks ago.”
“Yeah…” Jon said. “But what are the odds of that happening?”
“I lack sufficient data to make an accurate guess,” Gloria said. “It does imply that the AIs have surveillance units in the Solar System. But Jon, that’s not the problem right now. What should we do about the Gilgamesh? It appears they’re going to pick you up. Should I send—?”
Harsh crackling over Jon’s headphones drowned out whatever Gloria was going to say next.
“Frank,” a woman said. “Can you hear me, Frank?”
“This is Jon Hawkins. Why are you jamming my signals with the Nathan Graham?”
A few seconds passed.
“Jon Hawkins,” the woman said.
“Are you Vela Shaw?” he asked.
“I am. What have you done to the Premier?”
“Not a thing,” Jon said. “In fact, I saved his bacon, provided he’s still alive. The robots ambushed—”
“I am uninterested in your lies,” Vela said. “You have staged this deception. Now, you are about to pay the penalty—”
“Hold it right there,” Jon said. “I have Benz in a med tube. He could be dying. Maybe you can revive him. I don’t know. But you’re going to have let us go to the Nathan Graham.”
Vela laughed mockingly. “Why would I do something so foolish?”
“Because I’ll jettison Benz if you don’t,” Jon said.
Vela became thoughtful. Several times, she almost spoke before turning quiet again.
“Very well,” she said at last. “I will let you live, and I will allow you to return to the Nathan Graham. First, you must allow us to rescue the Premier. I also demand that you come aboard for questioning.”
Jon floated through space as the Gilgamesh grew rapidly in size. What was the right choice? He was limited to killing them both, or allowing Vela Shaw to take him as an effective prisoner.
Was the woman’s word worth anything? He didn’t know. In the grand scheme of things, he doubted her word if they could use him to grab power. He didn’t trust Benz. If the Premier had already died in the med tube—
Jon swore harshly under his breath. This was more than just about him. This was about the survival of people. He had knowledge about the robot ambush. If he spaced Benz and Vela Shaw killed him, the Nathan Graham would no doubt attack. That might cost humanity both its cyberships.
He was going to have to take a calculated risk and trust the two Mars Unity super-geniuses.
“Fine,” he said over the comm. “Pick us up. Benz needs immediate medical attention if he’s going to survive.”
-11-
Jon spent the next seven hours alone in a room on the Gilgamesh cut off from everyone. He did not know that Gloria had demanded and received audio and visual confirmation that he was okay.
He slept a good part of the time as the two pirated cyberships moved to within five hundred kilometers of each other. The asteroid was beneath both vessels as teams from the two ships scoured the surface for more robots.
Vela and Gloria agreed to split the robot debris, as shuttles hauled the destroyed pods, robot ship and octopoids into the cybership science labs.
Jon woke up in time and began demanding something to eat. Finally, a Martian marine rolled in food and drink. The marine told him that his people were watching him through cameras.
“Release me then,” Jon said.
The marine shook his head. “Commodore Shaw is waiting for the Premier’s decision.”
“Benz is alive?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Was he seriously hurt?”
“I’m not supposed to say.”
“I think I understand,” Jon said.
The marine left.
Jon sat down to eat. He looked up, trying to locate a hidden camera. He wondered if the marine had told him the truth. He shrugged, and began telling Gloria what had happened on the asteroid. If this was a trick to get him to talk, it didn’t matter. The truth was on his side.
He paced after eating, considering the situation. He began to believe Gloria could see and hear him. She would have demanded confirmation he was alive and okay on a continuous basis. Likely, Gloria had threatened an attack. Since no attack had taken place, the logical reason would be that Vela Shaw had complied enough for an uneasy truce. It had to be uneasy. Otherwise, he would have already been back aboard the Nathan Graham.
How would he handle things if he had Benz aboard the Nathan Graham? He would use kid gloves on the man, and prove to Benz’s people that he was doing so. Then, why was Shaw still keeping him?
The answer came four hours later.
The hatch opened. Jon sat up from where he lay on a cot. A medical chair wheeled in carrying an extremely pale Frank Benz. Several tubes were stuck into his flesh. A heavy bandage and med-pack were affixed to his neck. The same marine as before pushed the Premier and his med-chair into the room.
“Feeling better?” Jon asked.
“Not really,” Benz said in a hoarse voice. “You can go,” he said over his shoulder.
The marine hesitated and then nodded. When the hatch opened, Jon saw a concerned Vela Shaw standing outside. The hatch slid shut, blocking her and the marine from view.
“You don’t look all right,” Jon said. “Your people are clearly concerned about you.”
“I’ve lost a lot of blood and I came close to dying,” Benz admitted. “Your prompt action appears to have saved my life. Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.”
A lopsided grin slid onto Benz’s half-frozen features. “They pumped me full of painkillers, naturally. Still, I believe I have my wits about me.”
“Sure,” Jon said.
“I must tell you that I feel an absurd amount of gratitude at finding myself alive. I owe you one, Hawkins.”
“That’s great. I have to tell you that you do a wonderful job of showing it by keeping me a prisoner.”
“I know, I know,” Benz said slowly. “You must wonder why you’re still aboard the Gilgamesh.”
“The thought has crossed my mind.”
“I find myself with something of a dilemma,” Benz said. “The SFF is particularly dependent upon you and your personality—and, of course, so is your cybership.”
“Is this still being beamed to the Nathan Graham?”
“It is,” Benz said.
“How do I know that to be true?” Jon said.
“I will demonstrate,” Benz said. With a
shaky hand, he clicked the left armrest of his med-chair. “Say hello to your captain, Mentalist.”
“Jon,” Gloria said from a wall speaker. “Are you well?”
“They haven’t hurt me yet or drugged me to my knowledge,” Jon said.
“Are we operating on the Frederick Principle?” Gloria asked.
“Yes,” Jon said.
Benz clicked the same armrest, apparently cutting the direct connection. “What is the Frederick Principle?” Benz asked.
“You mean you can’t figure it out?” Jon said.
Benz stared at him, finally shaking his head slowly.
“It’s Frederick as in Frederick the Great of Prussia,” Jon said. “He fought many European wars against the French, Austrians and Russians in the 1700s. Most of the time, Prussia was heavily outnumbered. Frederick did more than hold his own. He often managed to pull off stunning victories.”
“And the principle is…?” Benz asked.
“Frederick told his generals and ministers that he should no longer be considered the king if the enemy captured him.”
“Ah…” Benz said. “Yes, I see. You just told the mentalist to assume command.”
Jon nodded. “As long as I’m a prisoner, I am not the commander of the Nathan Graham or the leader of the SFF.”
“My congratulations on having code words to give at a time like this,” Benz said. “It shows that you plan for eventualities.”
Jon said nothing.
“To continue,” Benz said. “You are a critical ingredient to the Nathan Graham and the SFF. If I intern you here, I suspect I could more easily gain what I desire.”
“Which is control of the Solar System?” asked Jon.
“That isn’t as needful as positive human unity against the AIs.”
“Your being in charge would be the most positive outcome?”
“Not to put too fine a point upon it,” Benz said, “but I suspect so.”
“So where does that put us?”
“Yes,” Benz said. “That is the question. I believe I would be dead if you hadn’t acted so forcefully and promptly. You seemed to have planned for such an event. I had not deemed such precaution as necessary. I find my oversight galling, to say the least.”
A.I. Battle Station (The A.I. Series Book 4) Page 4
