Beta Testers

by Joseph R. Lallo

“Once. And it wasn’t nearly so… exciting.”

  The journey was mercifully short. A few minutes in, the field of flashing collisions was replaced by the shock front of reentry. By the time they’d dropped down to a more atmosphere-friendly velocity, their shields were below 50 percent and flashing a warning, but no other damage had been recorded. Once they were at nonlethal speeds, the inertial inhibitor began to dial down, easing them into their seats and providing them with the sensation of motion for the first time since they last left port.

  Once again the synthesized voice returned. “Welcome to the Big Sigma Research Facility. We apologize for any discomfort experienced during your journey. This system is still under active development. A ‘better’ system would have provided you with a smoother ride.”

  “No doubt,” Garotte scoffed.

  “You are permitted landing privileges in the mid-facility courtyard. The location has been marked in your low-altitude maps. If you would prefer, manual navigation can now be restored.”

  “Please,” Garotte said.

  “Restoring manual navigation now.”

  The control panel flickered and instantly started blaring warnings. Garotte hadn’t had time to actually take active control of the ship before the autopilot shut down, leaving the ship to literally drop out of the sky. Its thrusters and other engines simply shut off. Without the dampeners in place, both Garotte and Silo were nearly thrown from their seats before he finally managed to wrestle the Belle under control.

  “A bit of warning would not have been out of place,” Garotte said.

  “The navigation transition was executed at your request. It has now been noted that you prefer to be warned of forthcoming request fulfillment.”

  Silo drummed her fingers on the console, then pushed a curl or two out of her face. “Garotte, when we briefly discussed the reason for this visit, you explained it was a matter of supply, funding, and testing.”

  “Yes.”

  “I had imagined we would be dealing with a military contractor of some kind.”

  “We are. One of the best.”

  “I’ve only met one or two, hon, but from what I remember, this isn’t how those people run a business.”

  “This particular individual is a supplier of more specialist equipment.”

  “You want to maybe be a little less vague, hon?”

  “Equipment that does not presently exist and—on moral, ethical, physical, and legal grounds—should never exist.”

  “Sounds like a real peach, this one.”

  “He is, like many unsavory characters one encounters on the less formal side of interplanetary defense, a necessary evil.”

  “I’m not sure I like the idea of being associated with someone who sounds like either a war criminal or a war profiteer.”

  “Fortunate that I had the foresight to provide you with a cover identity then, Silo.”

  #

  A short atmospheric flight brought them to the actual laboratory facility, which, aside from crater-strewn fields and thin glazes of ice, seemed to be the only distinctive feature on the entire planet. Three buildings, each roughly identical, stood around a courtyard that had been kept largely free from the debris strikes that littered the rest of the surrounding fields.

  After an entry interview and disinfecting spray administered by the same tiresome voice system, Garotte and Silo stepped into the sort of soulless, clinical facility that governments and bureaucracies seemed to think fostered creativity and cooperation. It was nothing but a series of long hallways lit by banks of cool, moonlight-white lighting. Here and there large windows offered glimpses into conference-room-sized laboratory stations, most in spotless condition awaiting an engineering team that was nowhere to be seen.

  “This Dee fellow seems like he’s got a pretty decent lab,” Silo said, glancing about.

  “He ought to. Though it isn’t entirely straightforward to dig up a list of his prior clients, the man has worked on some of the most vital projects in recent memory, typically as a consultant.”

  “Hey,” called a gruff voice down the hall. “Don’t go violating any NDAs on me. Those people pay good money to keep my involvement under wraps.”

  Dr. Dee emerged from around a corner. At first blush he looked more like a mechanic than a well-funded military engineer. He wore a grease-smeared pair of overalls not so different from those Garotte had worn under his guise as a maintenance man back on Tessera. His expression was one of mild irritation, and it was easy to imagine the look was a permanent fixture on his face. As he stepped up to them, he brought the wafting smell of strong solvents, industrial lubricants, and three or four other equally strong but not immediately identifiable scents.

  “It is a pleasure to once again—” Garotte began, offering a hand.

  “Yeah, yeah, blah, blah. We’re here for business, not that crap.” Dee looked to Silo. “Who’s this one?”

  “This fine young lady is my associate and partner for this mission, Miss Silvia Lowell.”

  Dee looked her up and down. “I’ve seen worse. Come on.”

  He turned to walk away. Silo’s jaw tightened.

  “I’ve seen worse?” she rumbled under her breath.

  “Unfortunately, incomprehensible brilliance and social maladjustment are a common pairing. Our dealings with him will be brief, I assure you. Just weather his—”

  Dee raised his voice to speak over Garotte without looking back. “You said you were down for some hard-core beta testing, right?”

  “Indeed. Contingent upon your capacity to fulfill our equipment needs and the applicability of the equipment undergoing testing to the specific needs of our mission.”

  “Yeah, yeah. I’ve got your crap. Well…” He looked up. “Ma, have we got their crap?”

  “Yes, Dr. Dee,” replied the voice system. “As requested, I have fabricated all requested equipment. It is displayed for testing purposes on the weapons testing floor.”

  “Good, good. Let’s get down there.” Dee marched toward an elevator at the end of the hall. “While we’re on our way, what’s this mission?”

  “Top secret,” Garotte said.

  “Like hell it’s top secret. You wouldn’t be coming here in a botanist’s ship with your lady friend if you worked for an agency with the authority to apply a top-secret rating to a project. You’re an independent contractor.”

  “All the same, the specific details of the mission are not for distribution.”

  “Fine, fine. Ma! Dig up one of the boilerplates for testing crews. Another one for me to sign to give this limey jerk the peace of mind to actually tell me what he’s going to do so I can find stuff for him to test.”

  They stepped onto the elevator.

  “Dr. Dee, I must say, you are even more charming than I recall,” Garotte said.

  “You want charming, go to an embassy for one of those puppet republics planetary warlords set up for public relations. They’ll charm the pants off you. And it’ll probably cost you less. But you don’t want charming. You want firepower. And for that, you came to the right place.”

  The elevator doors opened to reveal a dimly lit floor. It ran nearly from one end of the building to the other, and aside from some assorted targets on the far end of the floor and some heavily fortified and reinforced support columns, it was almost entirely empty. At least, it seemed that way until a few banks of lights snapped on theatrically, revealing a row of stands each arrayed with an armory of pristine weaponry.

  “All right, we’ll start with ballistics,” Dee said.

  He plucked equipment free one by one and rattled off features with the weary tone of someone who’d had to do so with such frequency he could now do it in his sleep.

  “Standard sidearm, pistol form factor. This has got the 9x19mm ammo configuration, normal and extended magazines included. Semi- and full-auto modes, fifteen-hundred rounds per minute on full auto. Programmable charge in cartridges, good for dialing muzzle velocity to subsonic or supersonic values for a give
n atmosphere.”

  “Where’s the suppressor?” Garotte asked.

  He tapped the side of the barrel. “Phase-shifted sonic transducer to actively cancel discharge waveforms. For any subsonic rounds, it should attenuate the discharge by around ninety-two percent. Not so great for supersonic, what with the shock wave to contend with, but you can’t have everything. This comes with the requested two thousand rounds. Seems a little low if you ask me.”

  “Ideally I won’t be using it much.”

  “Uh-huh. Moving on, there’s the sniper rifle. I see we went with the big ol’ 0.57 caliber monster. Excellent choice. Same programmable loads, same active noise cancellation, though less useful since I can’t imagine you’ll have much interest in firing subsonic. I think we’ve got this up to a maximum effective range on the order of twenty-five hundred meters in standard atmosphere. We’ve got that paired up with a linear accelerator rifle and some assorted rounds, including a personal favorite, the proximity detonated microgrenades. Five hundred rounds for the ballistic, two hundred of each round type for the linear. Naturally we’re throwing in all the bells and whistles with regards to sights, stabilizers, range finders, etc.”

  “Splendid.”

  “Yeah. On to the good stuff. Energy weapons. Both pistol and rifle form factor, thermal energy feedback for maximum firing rate and cell efficiency. The pistol is good for punching through standard body armor all the way up to light vehicle armor, the rifle will blow a hole through… whatever you want to blow a hole in, really. Now, if you want to do more than put a hole in it, that’s what this stuff is for.”

  He hefted a truly hostile looking piece of equipment from the rack. It was about the size of a golf bag, composed mostly of tubes and hydraulics. Though it must have weighed on the order of dozens of kilograms, he moved it with remarkable ease.

  “Who ordered the rocket launcher? I’m guessing it’s the lady. Because man-portable or not, a scrawny spy-type isn’t liable to be able to handle this thing. The lady here’s got some meat on her.”

  “I suppose you’ll want me to interpret that as a compliment?” Silo said.

  “Interpret it however you want, it was an observation of fact.” He handed over the launcher. “Now if you picked this sucker out, you’ve got excellent taste. Separate propulsion and warhead subsystems. Propulsion is provided by these little repulsor pucks.”

  He held out what looked like a rocket nozzle on the end of a coaster.

  “Loaded via separate magazine. Stackable for greater total acceleration. Controllable via remote, via preprogrammed target tracking, or by onboard sensors good for everything from heat to electromagnetic output. You can stock this thing with four separate warhead magazines, and it looks like you asked for the high-explosive, thermite, electro-jammer, knockout gas, sticky mine, and transponder heads. I threw in some tactical nukes for good measure. Never can have too many nukes.”

  Silo cradled the contraption in her arms like a long-lost child. “I didn’t think I’d ever actually hold one of these. Back on my active duty days they had maybe one of these per division…”

  Dee shook his head. “Penny-pinching bureaucrats. It’s policies like that that lead to hard times with us arms manufacturers. I assume you’re also the one who wanted the grenade launcher. Twin magazine, good choice. Keeping two ammo types on hand can be a life saver. Basically the same ammo assortment as the rockets. Again, all good choices.”

  “Now see, hon, you keep talking like that and handing me things like this and I’m liable to change my mind about you,” Silo said.

  “Whoop-dee-doo. A few final points. I didn’t give you tactical nukes for the grenade launcher since the smallest nuke I have has a blast radius larger than the max range of the grenade launcher. Also, before you go, you’re going to have to do a short training sequence with each gun. We’ve got grip-identification systems in them so that they’ll only operate for authorized users, which means I’ve got to zero in on the grip signature for each of you.”

  “That’s fine. I was rather hoping to confirm proper functionality on all of these delights before I took them into battle. But there is still the matter of the other equipment,” Garotte said.

  “Ma, what else was there?” Dee bellowed.

  “A secure data radio as well as assorted network penetration tools,” the system replied.

  “Did we get those ready?”

  “Yes, Dr. Dee.”

  “Good.”

  A mechanical arm rattled out of a side hatch and rolled toward them. It clutched a tray loaded with printed documents and ballpoint pens.

  “What’s this, Ma?”

  “The beta-testing agreement.”

  “Ah. Yeah, sign this and we’ll get to the prototypes I want you to try.”

  Silo picked up the several-dozen-page document with her false name already filled out on the cover page.

  “This is… a pretty darn thick agreement,” she said. She started to flip through while Garotte scribbled an illegible signature and tossed it down. “Aren’t you going to read it?” she asked.

  “The contents of the contract are immaterial. We need the funding the testing will provide,” Garotte said.

  She skimmed a few pages. “Not responsible for… does this say ‘tectonic inversion’?”

  “Yes,” the voice system said.

  “What’s that?”

  “It is any event that causes the continental plates of a rocky planet with a liquid mantle to disconnect and rotate upon a latitudinal or longitudinal axis.”

  “And something we’re using might cause that?”

  “Beats me. That’s why I hire people like you to test them,” Dee said.

  “And what’s this ‘Red Goo Scenario’?”

  Again the voice system began to answer. “A Red Goo Scenario is one in which the entirety of the organic population of a region or world is converted into—”

  “It doesn’t matter what it is,” Dee said impatiently. “The point is, if you somehow cause one by using one of my devices, then it isn’t my fault.”

  “I’m not sure I’m comfortable with this.”

  “Can you afford to buy that rocket launcher on your present salary?” Garotte asked.

  “No.”

  “Do you intend to flip over any continents?”

  “No.”

  “Then sign the bloody paper. We don’t have many options at this point.”

  She sighed and traced out her assumed name on the signature page. “This keeps getting better and better,” she said and placed the signed contract on the tray. The arm whisked it away.

  “Good, now that the lawyers are appeased, let’s see how you’re paying for all of this stuff,” Dee said. He led the way back to the elevator, talking along the way. “Since you seem to think you’re going to need some serious firepower and you’re dead set on keeping your precious secrets, we’ll start with some weapons I’ve wanted to have tested in the field. These are mostly my own take on preexisting concepts, but most of those concepts didn’t work so well because they were designed by idiots.”

  The doors opened and they disembarked onto a similar floor, though with far more substantial armor on the walls and far more warning indicators scattered about. The equipment on the rear wall on either side of the elevator, though sporting typical things like barrels and triggers at times, bore little resemblance to the sort of weapons that would warrant such precautions.

  “Let’s see,” the inventor said, looking over the unusual armory. “Ah, the targeted system shocker.”

  He lifted a device with the distinctive lack of fit and finish indicative of a product still under development. A rough, rapidly prototyped enclosure secured two stout tubes of electronics to a bank of additional electronics. Gray tape held bundles of wires together, and the whole mess had been affixed to a pistol grip with two triggers, one behind the other. It looked like someone had attempted to build a double-barrel shotgun out of parts scavenged out of an old refrigerator.

&nb
sp; “This is an antivehicular weapon, two-stage activation, zero kickback. Ma, roll out something appropriate for me to shoot at,” Dee said.

  He clicked a switch on the side, and the thing produced an edge-of-hearing whine that spoke volumes of the power levels involved. After a few moments the sound dropped away, only to be replaced by a throaty hum at the target-strewn end of the floor. A small drone craft, perhaps half the size of a standard hovercar, drifted into view from a side hatch. At the same time, another mechanical arm arrived with a new tray, this one loaded with tinted safety glasses and what looked like earbuds.

  “Shall I deliver the safety warning, Dr. Dee?” asked the voice system.

  “Yeah, fine,” he said, taking a pair of the glasses and slipping them on.

  As Garotte and Silo donned their own glasses, the voice worked through a very formally worded lecture.

  “The devices in this room and elsewhere in the facility are highly dangerous and have not completed mandatory safety testing. Eye and hearing protection are to be worn at all times. For your convenience, we have provided adaptive wavelength laser safety glasses, each made from high-impact polymers in order to offer further protection against any potential debris. Additionally, a reactive hearing protection system has been provided, which attenuates all sound to safe levels and selectively rebroadcasts voice in order to—”

  “Things blow up and burst into flames, etc., etc.,” Dee interrupted. “Stage one, lasers.”

  He clicked the weapon into a stand and leaned down to gaze along a line drawn in black marker in lieu of a proper sight. Once he was happy with the aim, he squeezed the first trigger. A potent line of coherent red light burst forth, hissing against the chassis of the drone.

  “As you can see, lasers don’t do a whole hell of a lot to drones and other vehicles above a certain level of fortification. However, one of the fun side effects of a laser is its tendency to heat up a tunnel of atmosphere until it’s basically a column of plasma. And one of the fun things about plasma is that it is highly conductive. Thus…”

  Dee squeezed the second trigger. Both beams of laser light briefly vanished, replaced instead with what could only be called twin bolts of lightning. The drone lurched, then shut down, dropping to the floor with a thunderous crash.