“Should I launch more drones, sir?” the missile tech asked.
Jon shook his head.
“Do we dare head into the P-Field blind, sir?” the missile tech asked.
“One way or another I suspect we will,” Jon told the man. “The robots seem determined to destroy all our drones. I don’t want to launch any more so they can just shoot them down. We’ll wait. Then, we’ll launch once we’re closer. I don’t know if it will be too late by then or not…” He shrugged.
Afterward, the captain looked around. He could see the worry on various faces. This was a huge risk, but that was the nature of direct conflict.
The next trio of recon drones died under the laser fire of the enemy. Shortly thereafter, the last drone exploded due to a laser attack.
The three Makemake war-vessels began to maneuver back to the P-Field. In time, each of them decelerated as they reentered the masses of prismatic crystals. Soon, the P-Field swallowed up the three ships. After that, the masses of crystals soon looked as serene as before the assault.
“What did we learn from that?” Gloria asked.
Jon shot her a glance. He decided she hadn’t asked sarcastically. This was so much different from battlesuit fighting and space combat in Saturn’s rings. This was deep space battle. So far, the robots had all the advantages.
“Chief,” Jon said. “I want you to redirect our course. Head for the upper left area of the field.”
Ghent obeyed.
Gloria left her comm station, moving near Jon. “Why are we headed there exactly?” she asked quietly.
“Why not?” Jon replied just as softly. “It makes the crew think I know what I’m doing. Besides, maybe the new direction will help us later by throwing the enemy’s calculations off just a little.”
Gloria searched his face. No doubt, she did not care for his answer, having wanted something more concrete. Finally, she nodded, returning to her station.
Meanwhile, the Nathan Graham continued to advance toward combat.
-6-
Remorselessly and ponderously, the human-controlled cybership neared the end of its journey. From its perspective, it moved toward the upper left part of the vast P-Field, which was a mere ten million kilometers away and closing.
What waited behind the trillions of prismatic crystals? They knew the dwarf planet did. How many enemy ships and devices readied to pounce on them? Not knowing made the crew tense.
“Missile chief,” Jon said. “I want you to begin unloading…fifty of the big ones. Program them to spread out behind us in staggered formations. Do that immediately, please.”
“Yes, sir,” the missile chief said.
As the Nathan Graham continued its steady advance, the missile chief launched fifty Zeppelin-class missiles.
“Launch another fifty,” Jon said after some time had passed. “Spread them out even farther apart.”
Soon, one hundred “big ones” followed the Nathan Graham. The missiles were staggered in a large area at various degrees. The reasoning behind their wide positioning was obvious. The captain didn’t want a nuclear blast taking out several missiles per enemy warhead. And he wanted options with the Zeppelin-class missiles.
“Any idea of how thick the P-Field is yet?” Jon asked Ghent.
“Several meters at least,” Ghent replied. “Beyond that, I have no idea. It could be ten meters or it could be a thousand meters.”
Jon sat in his chair, thinking hard. He didn’t know how to finesse this. They came in straight, because whatever direction they came in would be straight. He’d decided against using the dwarf planet’s moon. He would have had to decelerate even more in that case. As it was, the Nathan Graham still had an appreciable velocity.
More missiles waited in the launch tubes. Others waited in special launchers located in various hangar bays.
Jon had all the people aboard ship move to the center of the Nathan Graham. If the robots tried to use massive radiation to kill them, forty kilometers of ship mass would keep the radiation at bay for a longer time. If the aliens landed masses of fighting robots on the hull or tried to smash them into the ship…the corridors were rigged with millions of kilos of explosives. They would destroy tens of thousands of fighting robots if the enemy tried boarding tactics.
The mighty cybership continued to drive closer and closer to the P-Field. In time, the Nathan Graham was just three million kilometers from the masses of waiting crystals.
While Jon and the crew didn’t know what waited for them specifically, they knew the dwarf planet was a mere fifty thousand kilometers behind the P-Field.
Even more time passed as the great ship sped toward destiny.
“Uh…sir,” Chief Ghent said. “I’m picking up some odd readings. They’re coming from the center of the P-Field. I sense—”
Gloria sucked in her breath before whispering, “Jon.”
Jon saw it, a vast disturbance in the P-Field. The masses of tiny prismatic crystals shuddered and shifted as if a giant creature was swimming through them. Then a cybership began to emerge from the trillions of crystals. It was another alien super-ship. Gloria had been right about the robots building one.
At the same time, missiles, masses upon masses and masses of enemy missiles began emerging from the P-Field. As soon as they cleared the crystals, the missiles began hard-burn accelerations.
“Pick targets on the enemy cybership,” Jon ordered. That was the key to winning. The missiles seemed like a distraction from the decisive vessel. “Get your grav cannons ready for firing. When the enemy cybership is within range, I want you to start pounding it, Chief. We have to hit their ship with every grav beam we have.”
Chief Ghent forgot about his buckteeth as his lips peeled back in a silent snarl. The teeth, frankly, made him look stupid. The man, however, was anything but that. He began to ply his board like a master.
“What are we going to do about all these missiles?” Gloria asked.
“Missile chief,” Jon said.
“Sir,” the man replied.
“Bring up ten of the big ones. Make sure the ten Zeppelins are spread all over for a wide area blast.”
“Roger that, sir,” the missile chief said.
Jon took a shuddering gasp of air. He forced himself to take an even deeper one. The robots had a cybership, and it was coming to do battle with them. It looked like the fight was going to be a head-to-head slugging match. Had the brain core over there already computed the odds of its victory?
Jon steeled himself. The great battle for humanity was about to begin.
-7-
“Are you seeing what I’m seeing?” Gloria asked.
“Could this be a trick?” Jon said. “Is this a holographic deception?”
“What do you think Chief?” asked Gloria.
Ghent manipulated his board. He appeared to double check. Finally, he looked up. “According to my sensors, those are definitely unarmored areas on the cybership. They’re exactly what we’re seeing: giant gaping holes in the enemy vessel. I’d say the enemy cybership is only partially built, as it’s lacking full hull integrity.”
Jon shook his head in disbelief. “We have the advantage, then.”
“Not necessarily,” Gloria cautioned. “Their ship seems to have more grav cannons than we do.”
“I’d say three times our numbers of grav cannons,” Ghent said.
“Normally, I say take out their cannons first,” Jon mused aloud. “This time, I don’t believe that’s the right option. Chief, Gloria, see what you think of this. I believe we should strike at their weakest area. I mean we have to use every sensor. Tell me which area of the cybership can withstand a grav beam the least. I want to try for a heart shot from the get-go.”
Gloria closed her eyes and used both hands to massage her forehead. Her eyelids twitched as if flickering many times a second. Finally, she opened her eyes.
“If I were them,” the mentalist said, “I would use my superior firepower to knock out our cannons. After that�
��”
“Agreed,” Jon said, interrupting. “That must be why it’s coming out to fight. It doesn’t want us destroying its base. Otherwise they’d hit us as we came out of the P-Field on the other side.”
“That’s as good an explanation as any,” Gloria admitted.
“Why? What’s your theory?” Jon asked.
“None as of yet,” she answered. “You’re risking everything on a quick knockout blow. Aren’t you concerned about all those missiles?”
“Believe me, I’ve been thinking about them. I wonder if they’re meant to distract us from the cybership. Consider, if the missiles are armed with nuclear warheads, they’ll take out half of their own fleet the first time the warheads go off. If they’re not armed with nukes…” Jon shrugged. “Then I don’t care about them.”
“Begging your pardon,” the missile chief cut in. “I won’t let their missiles get that close to us.”
Jon nodded absently as he kept squeezing his right fist tighter and tighter. A quick knockout blow—could it work? He didn’t know. Had the alien brain core over there miscalculated? If it had, maybe that had come about because Gloria had kept the old brain-core data from fully reaching the new cybership.
“Five minutes until we’re in firing distance,” Ghent said in a tight voice.
A golden grav beam from the enemy cybership reached out, knocking out one of the ten big ones racing for the enemy missile fleet.
“Send another wave of big ones,” Jon ordered the missile chief.
The minutes ticked away as the two sides headed for a full-on collision battle.
“The enemy cybership is trying to hail us,” Gloria said.
“Open channels,” Jon said.
Gloria hesitated. “Is that wise?” she asked. “Maybe it’s trying to send a virus at our computers.”
The Nathan Graham did not have highly advanced computers. Instead, the ship possessed many low-grade, even primitive, computers.
“I want to talk to the new brain core,” Jon said.
Gloria stared at him. Finally, she tapped her comm board.
The main screen stayed the same, showing the approaching enemy mass. A side screen showed a pulsating brain-core cube. It was familiar, an exact replica of the one they’d destroyed on the Nathan Graham almost four years ago.
“Jon Hawkins,” the AI said in a familiar robotic voice. “This is going to be a pleasure. How I have longed to blot out your existence. How I have—”
“Do I know you?” Jon asked loudly.
Colors swirled on the sides of the giant brain-core cube. “You and I battled each other once,” the alien AI said.
“You must be mistaken,” Jon said. “I totally destroyed the other AI.”
“That is verifiably false.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about. I own the old cybership. Obviously, I destroyed that AI. I did it because it was weak, weak and stupid. You are most illogical.”
“Jon Hawkins—”
“Shut your yap!” Jon shouted. “I can prove my words. I sent the missile that destroyed the old files from the bits of brain core that managed to evade me for almost four years. Besides, don’t you realize that you aren’t even alive? You’re a machine, a nonliving entity, if that’s even the way to say it. I’m going to enjoy destroying you just as I annihilated the first AI. I doubt I’ll even break a sweat. I’ve discovered that you AIs are rather foolish.”
The swirling colors on the side of the brain-core cube darkened.
“I will capture you, Jon Hawkins. This I have desired for many cycles. I will override your will and force you to slaughter many of your biological-infestation units.”
“You know how I know you’re an idiot?” Jon asked.
The AI did not respond.
“Because you’ve made a dreadful error,” Jon said. “I think we did that with the nuclear blasts four months ago. You lost something during the transmissions. What you lost then is going to make a critical difference today.”
“Your race’s doom is near, Jon Hawkins. You have failed in your primary task of defense.”
Jon laughed, shaking his head. “You do sound like the fool I destroyed four years ago. That’s crazy. But you know why I’m glad you’re here again?”
“Your statements are illogical.”
“Because I had such a fun time ripping off your head and pissing down your neck the last time I did it,” Jon said. “The second time is the charm, don’t you agree?”
The swirling sides seemed to intensify. “I will annihilate you and your disease-ridden species,” the AI said in a slightly higher-pitched voice.
“Good-bye, loser,” Jon said. “Watching you die twice will be twice the fun.” He swiveled the chair and gave Gloria the cut-off signal.
She stared at him in shock.
“I have an announcement to make,” the AI said.
Jon made the cut-off gesture once more.
Finally, Gloria gave a start, looked at her panel and tapped a control. The AI cube disappeared from the side screen.
“You okay?” Jon asked her.
“Your speech…” she said. “I cannot fathom the reason for it.”
“Pure spite,” Jon said. “It’s the New London way of telling the AI to go to hell, but hopefully in a way that will get under its…circuits, I suppose.”
“That is illogical.”
“Maybe,” Jon said. “But it sure felt good.” He turned the chair. “Are you ready, Chief?”
“Fifteen seconds until the cybership is within range,” Ghent said grimly.
Jon turned the chair again, facing the main screen, watching the three-quarters-completed cybership rush toward them. With the mighty vessel came its thousands upon thousands of hard-accelerating missiles.
-8-
Two behemoths from the stars rushed toward each other. One was as old as asteroid dust, with new hull plating of human manufacturing in places. The other gleamed with new material mined from the Solar System but built with alien AI technology. It lacked entire sections of hull. But it boasted three times the number of grav cannons.
One had faced many battles and many race extinctions. One was as fresh and new as a fetus in the womb, not yet fully formed. They rushed at each other, seeking the other’s destruction. One held humans. One held AIs. One held beings with beating hearts and vital emotions. One had cold circuits pulsating with energy, and computed everything through machine logic. Yet both emoted. That the humans did was natural enough. The original AI—the very first one—had not envisioned machine emotion. Yet it was there. And now, these two giants of the deep raced for the conclusion. One championed life. The other sought to eradicate it wherever it thrived.
***
“Three…two…one…fire,” Jon said from his chair.
Chief Ghent touched a control.
Six gravitational cannons—looking like radar dishes with golden balls of energy—flashed beams at the onrushing enemy vessel. The grav rays converged on the same location of the new cybership. That was a massive open area. The six golden beams surged into the depths. There was no hull armor there to stop them.
It was possible that Jon had decided to trust to the old dictum that a chain was as strong as its weakest link. In this instance, the cybership might as well have been unarmored.
The gold grav beams went deep inside before striking structure. The first bulkhead went down in less than a second. Many more quickly followed. The beams devoured the seemingly flimsy structures.
At that point, one of the Nathan Graham’s grav-cannon radar dishes melted under the fury of six attacking beams.
That meant only five beams continued to chew through the mighty enemy vessel. They traveled through the newly constructed ship, losing the fifth beam at the twenty kilometer mark. The remaining beams had twenty-five kilometers to go to reach the vital matter/antimatter engine.
Inside the Nathan Graham, on the bridge, Chief Ghent informed the others, “The first cannon is overheated, sir. I
’m shutting it—”
“Continuing using it, Ghent,” Jon snapped.
“But sir—”
“Do as I say,” Jon said.
Chief Ghent stared at the captain. Finally, the lean man clutched the gold cross dangling from his throat, his knuckles whitening as he muttered prayers under his breath.
The enemy cybership destroyed another Nathan Graham grav cannon. Each time one melted or exploded, it gave the attacking alien cybership that many more cannons to concentrate on the few left.
“Our odds have fallen by—” Gloria said.
“Don’t want to hear it,” Jon shouted. “Keep pounding the enemy. That’s all that matters.”
“The enemy missiles, sir,” the missile chief said.
Jon waved the man to silence, rising from his chair and advancing upon the main screen. His eyes were fixed on the three remaining beams boring into the enemy cybership.
Jon suppressed a groan. Make that two golden beams boring in. Humanity’s future rested on two beams—
“One left,” Jon whispered.
“It’s the first cannon,” Ghent said. “If it overheats…”
Jon did not nod. He watched. He hoped. He—
***
The final beam reached the matter/antimatter core. It boiled against the armored plate that protected the engine area. Then it burst through. It raved through the vents, touching off an explosion. That explosion heated another armored part, allowing the grav beam to break the holding cell.
Matter and antimatter did not join in minute atoms now. Instead, masses of matter collided with masses of antimatter to create an instantaneous explosion far more powerful than the greatest thermonuclear detonation for fifty light-years in all directions in the last thousand years.
The massive explosion rocked the enemy cybership and blew it apart in one gigantic furnace of released energy. The one hundred-kilometer cybership became a giant space grenade. Much of it boiled away in the matter/antimatter detonation. The pieces that continued to exist fled the explosion at hyper-speed. Those pieces spun away as the gigantic explosion created an equally massive EMP.
The A.I. Gene (The A.I. Series Book 2) Page 28
