City of Phants (Argonauts Book 6)

by Isaac Hooke

  BOOKS BY ISAAC HOOKE

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  CITY OF PHANTS

  ARGONAUTS

  BOOK SIX

  Isaac Hooke

  This is a work of fiction. All characters, names, organizations, places, events and incidents are the product of the author's imagination or used fictitiously.

  Text copyright © Isaac Hooke 2017

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this publication may be copied, reproduced in any format, by any means, electronic or otherwise, without prior consent from the copyright owner and publisher of this book.

  www.IsaacHooke.com

  Cover design by Isaac Hooke

  Cover image by Shookooboo

  Special thanks to the following Beta Readers who helped out with this book:

  Nicole P.

  Gary F.

  Sandy G.

  Lance W.

  Amy B.

  Myles C.

  Lisa A. G.

  Gregg C.

  Jeff K.

  Mark C.

  Mark P.

  Jeremy G.

  Doug B.

  Jenny O.

  Gene A.

  Larry J.

  Allen M.

  Norman H.

  Robine

  Eric

  And thank you to the following Special Consultants:

  Martin P.

  Don M.

  table of contents

  one

  two

  three

  four

  five

  six

  seven

  eight

  nine

  ten

  eleven

  twelve

  thirteen

  fourteen

  fifteen

  sixteen

  seventeen

  eighteen

  nineteen

  twenty

  twenty-one

  twenty-two

  twenty-three

  twenty-four

  twenty-five

  twenty-six

  twenty-seven

  twenty-eight

  twenty-nine

  thirty

  postscript

  about the author

  acknowledgments

  one

  Rade stared at the laser-riddled body.

  It had once belonged to a beautiful woman. Beneath her form-fitting blue fatigues she had the muscle tone of an athlete, and with those high cheekbones, flawless skin, and chiseled brows, she could have been the face of an InterGalNet ad campaign. Her features were vaguely similar to Ms. Bounty, the host of Surus.

  Behind her, other women of similar beauty lay dead upon the grass in a long row like chopped down weeds. Dark bore holes penetrated their foreheads, execution style.

  They were Artificials, all of them. Robots sheathed in a layer of synthetic skin to appear human. But that didn’t make their deaths any less significant. Their AIs had been sentient, self-aware. They may as well have been human women.

  The stars peered down in cold observation from above, their light tinted blue by the anti-rad layer coating the glass panels of the geodesic dome, which showed no signs of damage. The internal atmosphere remained completely intact, the air breathable.

  Rade was viewing all of this from the comfort of his captain’s seat aboard the bridge of the Argonaut. He had piped into the video feed of one of the Centurions sent down to the destroyed base, a combat robot named Algorithm.

  The robot was obviously upset, because it did not advance for several seconds.

  “Are you all right, Algorithm?” Rade asked.

  “I am,” Algorithm said. “I just need... a moment.”

  “I understand,” Rade said with a heavy heart. “Proceed when ready. Check if any of the AI cores are recoverable.”

  None of them were.

  Nearby, the fist-sized HS3s moved in and out of the different one and two story concrete buildings, fanning across the dome interior. Rade glanced at the overhead map created by those scouts. So far, neither tangos nor signs of life had been detected.

  This was the base of operations Surus had created in human space, located on the moon Taurus 62, and administered under the guise of her company, Green Systems Incorporated. Rade had stayed in a guesthouse here, once, after helping the Greens save their homeworld.

  And now those Greens had turned on them. Or more specifically, they had turned on Surus, who insisted on hunting the Phants who remained in this region of the galaxy, despite the order from her High Council to cease and desist after a peace treaty had been signed between the Greens and the other Phants. In short, she was cut off and isolated: the Greens left behind in this region of space had severed all ties with Surus, and had attempted to drain her bank accounts. They had only partially succeeded in the latter.

  Already a Green in their region of space had personally betrayed the team. Corunna. The Green had paid the price, and was trapped inside the core of a star as her punishment, alongside the Purple Phant she had aided.

  Surus had expected the Greens to effect some sort of retaliatory action upon her, and she had sent a warning to her employees at the base, instructing them to clear out. Obviously, that warning hadn’t reached them in time. Surus had said, at one point, that she now hunted all Greens. After seeing what they had done to these innocent Artificials, he understood why.

  The Argonaut had entered orbit on high alert. Rade was worried the Greens would attempt to lay some sort of trap, so he remained in full view of the rest of the system, hoping that any space-based attack would attract the attention of the nearby Franco-Italian military base. Unfortunately, that outpost was four planets out.

  Surus had purposely situated her operations center on the far side of that remote moon, and out of view of any prying eyes in the rest of Taurus system. That decision had proven a double-edged sword, since it meant the base AI was reliant upon a lone comm node in orbit to communicate with the rest of the system. That comm node had been destroyed, preventing any distress signals from reaching the authorities.

  Surus had not yet notified those authorities of what had transpired here. And Rade wasn’t entirely certain she would, given the sensitive nature of some of the tech she had down there; even after Rade and his team were done here, and the base was destroyed, she probably wouldn’t. Which brought up another good point. Even if the base AI had been able to call for help, Rade wasn’t sure the personnel actually would have.

  Rade’s HS3s and Centurions explored the remaining buildings i
n the current dome. The latter combat robots retrieved explosive bricks from their harnesses and attached them to the different structures as they did so.

  Over the next few minutes the scouts discovered the bodies of eight more Artificials. When the current dome environment was cleared, the robots followed the paved walkway across the artificial turf to the perimeter. The hatch connecting to the adjacent dome had been burned through, its dark, jagged edges implying a plasma attack.

  Beyond, the buildings proved similar to the previous dome. The HS3s dispersed, and the Centurions meanwhile headed toward a large warehouse possessing a wide garage door in front. That door had been bashed inward, but inside the building proved empty.

  “The Titans are missing,” Lui said from his station. The Asian American had an ageless appearance, with skin so blemish free, and features so perfect, one would almost think he was an Artificial. That was what years of cumulative rejuvenation treatments would do to a man.

  “I see that,” Surus replied. The alien didn’t reside on the bridge of the Argonaut like Rade, but viewed the proceedings from her quarters in the cargo hold.

  “Over there,” Manic said. “Brat’s point of view.” Manic could have had the moth-shaped port-wine stain above his right eyebrow removed years ago, and yet he wore it as a badge of honor. He claimed it reminded him of his MOTH days. The stain appeared darker than usual, surrounded by purple tissue—likely the result of his most recent spat with Bender.

  Rade switched to the viewpoint of the aforementioned combat robot, “Brat,” and witnessed several humanoid shapes sprawled in front of a windowless, diminutive building composed entirely of metal. He understood it wasn’t so much that the building was tiny, but the shapes scattered before it were disproportionately large. He realized they were Titans; the mechs were sprawled behind laser-riddled shields. Two walker units, the same size as the Titans, resided near the building entrance, toppled to either side. Their gun turrets were blackened—obviously the weapons had seen a hell of a lot of use before they fell.

  “They fought valiantly to the end,” Tahoe said, seated at his station to Rade’s right. The Navajo had been with Rade from the very beginning, since the two hopped the border into the United Systems, back when it was known as the United Countries.

  Rade nodded slowly. Those particular Titan units had been running backup copies of the AIs Rade and the others used in their own mechs aboard the Argonaut, and contained exact copies of the engramic imprints responsible for memory and personality. Electron, Juggernaut, Nemesis... their twins had died fighting out there.

  The sight only further saddened Rade, but it also strengthened his resolve.

  Those who did this will pay.

  The HS3s entered the rent that had been blasted into the four-meter tall door of the building the Titans and walkers had been protecting, and the scouts passed the wreckages of two more walker robots just inside. Several laser-riddled Centurions lay in the hallway.

  The HS3s emerged in a circular vault. Ten more combat robots littered the floor of the chamber, where they, too, had made a last stand. But other than those robots, the chamber was empty.

  “It appears we are too late,” Surus said. “The Acceptor is gone.”

  “You think they used the Acceptor to send troops here from your homeworld?”

  “It’s possible,” Surus said. “But doubtful. All of these defenders are facing outward, as if defending the Acceptor from attack.”

  “So Noctua changed the linkage codes?” Rade asked.

  “I believe so,” Surus replied. “But if they captured Noctua, it would not take much effort to extract those codes from her. If they have the Acceptor, I have little doubt they now have full control of it.”

  “And what does that mean for us, specifically?” Rade said.

  “Unlimited reinforcements for their side,” Surus said. “Depending on what the Greens intend, that Phant invasion we’ve long spoken about, the one that was supposed to begin seven hundred years from now? It could be starting at this very moment. Then again, I doubt the High Council would allow them to send more than a few Greens.”

  “Not sure I want to rely upon this esoteric High Council of yours,” Rade said. “Especially considering they disowned you.”

  “Nor do I,” Surus said. “We’ve already had other Greens disobey direct orders of the High Council. Corunna, for example, when she sided with the Purple.”

  “So it’s just a little imperative that we find the Acceptor,” Rade said.

  “Just a little,” Surus agreed.

  The HS3s and Centurions finished exploring the buildings, and placed more charges before making their way to the final dome. The latter environment was filled with green plants as part of the base’s self-sustaining hydroponics operation. Like the atmosphere, it was a carryover from a time when Surus actually employed human scientists at her base. Apparently in later years she used it mostly for genetic experimentation, selling patents on modified crops to increase her once burgeoning bank accounts.

  The scouts discovered more dead Artificials in that dome, those responsible for the maintenance of the hydroponics equipment and crop experimentation, but otherwise there was no one.

  “This is unfortunate,” Surus said. “I was hoping to find the body of Noctua. At least then I would know that the codes had not fallen into enemy hands. But it seems obvious she has been captured. We have truly lost.”

  “You don’t know that,” Rade said. “It’s possible she got away in the X1.” That was the name of the experimental escape craft Surus had hidden on the far side of the moon, which had proven missing.

  “Just because there was no debris from the X1 does not mean the Greens did not capture it,” Surus said.

  “No,” Rade said. “But it doesn’t mean that they did capture it, either.”

  “If Noctua got away, I would have heard from her by now,” Surus said. “A message of some kind, sent over the InterGalNet. Or a note hidden somewhere in the base. But we have received nothing. Found nothing.”

  Rade sighed. She was right, but he was unwilling to concede it.

  “Algorithm,” Surus ordered over the comm. “Send me the final robot casualty count across the three domes.”

  “Thirty-two Artificials,” Algorithm said. “Ten Titans. Four walkers. Twenty-two Centurions.”

  “Five Artificials are missing, then,” Surus said. “My guess is they were used as hosts for the Greens, likely to delve their memories for anything pertaining to my activities in this region of space.”

  “All right,” Rade said. “So essentially, coming here was futile.”

  “No,” Surus said. “I still needed to destroy the base, so I had to come.”

  “Lui, how are we doing on ship movements throughout the system?” Rade asked his ops specialist.

  “All of the heat signatures in the Franco-Italian system are continuing along their present courses,” Lui said. “And no ships have emerged from hiding behind any of the planets.”

  “So no ambush,” Rade said.

  “Another indication that the Greens got what they wanted when they arrived,” Surus said. “They will strike at me in due time, of course. When we are well away from any military bases. I have no doubt they are watching us at this very moment. Waiting for an opportunity to strike. It is relatively easy to purchase orbital space these days, especially from the Franco-Italians. There could be spy satellites orbiting any of the planets and moons in this system.”

  “We’ve already switched the ship’s registry information three times since embarking on this mission,” Rade said. “We’re currently traders from Sirius, hauling a cargo of Columbian mules. You’re sure that won’t confuse any Greens attempting to track us?”

  “It’s possible we’ll fool them for a little while,” Surus said. “But unless you can modify the Argonaut’s heat signature as well, it won’t help all that much. There aren’t many Marauder class vessels in this region of space, unfortunately.”

  “All r
ight then, fine, if you were a Green,” Rade said, “when and where would you strike? Assuming you didn’t care about the human casualties involved?”

  “If I didn’t care about casualties?” Surus said. “Probably near a Gate. I’d wait on the other side, and when the Argonaut emerged, I’d open fire, then collect my prey from the wreckage.”

  “But what about the customs vessels?” Rade said. “They would stop you.”

  “I would disable the customs vessels first, of course,” Surus said. “I’d want vessels whose AI cores weren’t shielded from Phants, so it would have to be somewhere in Russian or Persian space for example.”

  “So they wouldn’t attempt an attack here?” Rade asked.

  “I didn’t say that,” Surus said. “Remember, they drained a third of my bank accounts. That gave them enough buying power to procure a couple of fully-armed warships, if they felt so inclined. With enough firepower, they could simply disable any customs ships and then capture my ship. They could throw me into a star, and then abandon the warships and retreat into the shadows, avoiding capture when the authorities or military reinforcements arrived.”

  “Interesting idea,” Rade said. “It makes me a little reluctant to travel back through the Gate when the time comes. But I have a feeling their attack would be more subtle. I don’t think they’d engage us in open space combat. Look at what they did here: they disabled the comm node, landed, and then quietly killed everyone, leaving the authorities none the wiser.”

  “That is true,” Surus said. “It would seem they want to avoid a galactic incident.”

  “This is odd,” Ulysses, another combat robot, transmitted from the surface.

  “What is it?” Rade asked.

  “A signal beacon of some kind just started up,” Ulysses replied. “It appears to be coming from the first dome. I’m guessing it was on a timer.”

  Rade exchanged a glance with Tahoe.