Making the Grade (Omnia Online Series Book 2)

by Christopher Booth

  “Doreen, she was the only team lead to show up, said that we should move forward to make contact with the guards near the emergency room. So we, Urson and I, followed her down the hall and around the corner. We were careful, but they seemed to expect us since they were waiting and had a trap set.”

  “Doreen was on point, she yelled for us to retreat and then something that sounded like ‘ambush close’ then she charged the invaders. She seemed to be trying to get close to the attackers… But even as we were obeying her order to retreat, we saw that she’d been hit by multiple shots.” said the guard.

  “Sorry about Urson, he’s new, and Doreen was a mentor to him, it really shook him up,” Ash concluded.

  “Sounds like she must have been in the service at one point, I think that‘ambush close’ thing she yelled was an automatically trained response.” replied Drake.

  “Yeah, she was a corporal in the Marines before she came to work in the hospital. She was my lead when I started working here three years ago,” said Ash.

  Drake sensed that Ash would like to take some time to grieve the loss of his friend, but Drake wasn’t sure they had the time right now.

  “Ok, Ash. Is it ok to call you that? Just call me Drake by the way.” said Drake.

  At the guard's nod, Drake continued, “Like I said the real enemy is a rogue A.I., which is why your comms are screwed. It’s likely your comm gear is even now being used against us, and maybe why you fell into an ambush. I would like you to remove any equipment you have that’s tied to the hospital's security and remove any batteries from them.” said Drake.

  The guard looked surprised at first, then thoughtful, by the time Drake was finished making his request Ash was already taking the power cell out of his handheld comm unit. Ash then took off his employ badge and left it all in the corner of the landing out of the way.

  “I can’t pull the power cell from the badge, but we use employee I.D.’s to track people's movement throughout the building. If the A.I. hacked that system, then it will know where everyone in the building is, including patients,” said Ash.

  Drake nodded, this was useful information.

  “Ok,” said Drake, “just remember, anything electronic is our enemy, I’ll take the lead. Shoot and kill any cameras or bots. I know that may sound odd, but anything in this building could be used to track us.”

  Drake’s companion nodded again, he was glad that Ash seemed to be a reasonable man. If he had started arguing at this point, Drake would have had to leave him behind. He still had to figure out a way to pass the word to the rest of the hospital security about being tracked… If they weren’t being hunted right now…

  Drake didn’t like the idea, but he could only be in one place at a time so he would push on and hope to bring an end to this mess his assignment was turning into.

  Drake looked through the vertical glass window in the door leading into the alcove from the stairs. Seeing no one, he pushed the door open a crack to make sure the wall beside the door was clear too.

  There was no one in the alcove, that contained the stairs and lifts.

  Drake hoped that most of the people who were able had already left the building.

  Drake cautiously approached the hall. As he did so, he could hear no noise from either direction.

  Drake took a look around the corner, and south down the hallway that eventually lead to the emergency room. The hall was clear of any people.

  Then he remembered to check for cameras, he could see three, pointing to where he now stood. One down the hall in either direction and one in the alcove he now shared with Ash.

  Drake pointed to the nearest camera, and tried to indicate that Ash should shoot it. Then he turned into the hall to shoot the two cameras there. He hit the first camera with a shot from his carbine, and it burst into pieces. Drakes second shot was a near miss, but his third destroyed the last camera Drake could see in the hall pointing in his direction.

  While Drake was taking care of the hall cameras, he could hear Ash firing at the nearest camera just above them. Drake heard two shots, with the second one being rewarded with falling pieces.

  Drake took another look down the hall. There was a door just twenty meters away on the right that looked torn apart.

  Drake looked around the alcove he was in. Yes, there was a red emergency box that was broken, which looked like it might have held a fire ax.

  Drake remembered the first guard saying something about a fire alarm, and wondered if the A.I. was having its people collect any fire ax they could. Since pulling one would have set off the alarm.

  Drake decided that he needed to take a look in the room on the right, since he didn’t want an enemy at his back with an ax.

  “Ash, was that door smashed in like that the last time you were through here?” asked Drake.

  “No, that’s the door to the psych ward. I would have noticed if it was even open since it’s locked down at all times,” replied Ash.

  Drake nodded and started heading for the broken door.

  Drake looked into what he had thought was a room, which turned out to be another hallway. This one was usually secured, but the door to this hall was chopped to pieces, and the remains of the door were hanging by a broken hinge.

  Drake could see no one in the corridor. But he did hear some sounds coming from around a corner about another forty meters away.

  As Drake moved down this hall, he noticed all the doors were closed, and had a panel next to each. The panels all had a red light glowing. Drake figured these doors were all locked. When he turned to point to a door and give Ash a questioning look, the guard just nodded and gave a hand sign that Drake didn’t recognize. But since the guard didn’t look concerned, he moved on in the direction of the noise.

  As Drake neared the corner, the sound of an ax striking wood grew louder.

  Drake took a quick look around the corner, and could see two people in the hall. One was a male Elf, who was swinging an ax at a door, while the other, a male Karurian stood and watched the progress. They were about twenty meters away down the perpendicular hallway.

  With all the noise, Drake was unconcerned about being overheard. So he turned to Ash and said, “I’m going to try to stun these guys, if they get withing ten meters of me, or bring out a weapon shoot to kill.”

  “Oh, and I should warn you, it may take a lot to bring one down, they seem to act like their on drugs or something,” said Drake.

  While talking, Drake slung his carbine and took out the stunner which was loaded with the electric stun darts.

  After Ash had given him a nod that seemed a little nervous, Drake stepped out into the hall crossway and took aim at the Elf still swinging the ax. He wasn’t noticed at first, which surprise Drake a little since his armor’s camo wasn’t active yet.

  After taking careful aim at the Elf, Drake pulled the trigger. The first shot hit the man in the side of his chest while he was bringing his arm up to take another swing with the ax.

  The Elf stumbled and went to one knee. The dart was designed to unleash a devastating amount of energy, the Elf should have dropped to the floor and been unconscious for a few minutes, but he seemed merely badly dazed instead.

  Drake didn’t have the time to consider the effect of the dart because as soon as the dart struck home, the Elf’s Karurian partner turned and aimed a previously unseen blaster at Drake.

  Three shots seemed to go off in near simultaneity.

  To Drakes immediate left, Drake heard the sound of a blaster being fired. The Karurian fired a shot just after Ash and Drake managed a shot of his own.

  Ash’s shot hit the avian male on his left shoulder, which may have been the cause of his shot missing Drake, since it went by a half meter high.

  The Karurian was still on its feet though when Drakes shot impacted on his right arm. The small dart gave off a shower of sparks and seemed to deflect off the Karurian’s feathered arm.

  Drake dived for the cover of a push cart to his right after his first s
hot was fired.

  The Karurian somehow managed to recover from both shots and get off another shot at Drake, scoring a hit on his left leg. Drake still had the momentum to get behind the metal push cart, and he heard some shots hit the far side of the cart.

  Drake dropped his stun gun while diving for cover, so he unslung his carbine. He briefly looked at his left leg; the damage was more severe than the almost healed wound to his chest. The blaster bolt had hit him on the side of the leg, in an area only partly covered by his leg armor.

  Drake also noticed that Ash had taken cover behind the corner of the cross corridor, and was returning fire on the man with the blaster.

  Drake pushed the cart out a little, so that he had a gap between the cart and the wall to shoot between.

  As Drake trained his carbine blaster on the Karurian, who was still standing in the hall, he noticed that the Elf was still on his knees and had yet to recover from the stun charge.

  Since the Karurian was still focused on Ash, Drake took aim and started to fire his carbine down the hall.

  Drakes experience with his brainwashed foe suggested it would take multiple shots to bring them down.

  His first shot hit the Karurian in the chest on his left side, the shot had more impact than Drake had expected. The Carbine blaster bolt pushed the avian man back causing him to stumble and some feathers to fly into the air.

  The man’s motion caused Drake’s second shot to hit him in the left arm, instead of the chest, which caused him to spin and go to his knees, with more feathers and blood flying into the air.

  Drakes third shot hit the Karurian in the lower back, throwing him forward onto his face, with his arms going out while the blaster pistol he’d been using went flying off to his right.

  Drake was sure the Karurian was out of the fight, for now, so he looked at the Elf.

  The Elf was getting up on his feet; he still looked unstable like he might fall any second, though. Drake turned and tried to find his missing stun gun.

  The weapon was about three meters away in the middle of the hall.

  Drake hoped he had the time to reach it, with his leg injured he would have trouble getting up and walking so he rolled three times to his left to get to the gun.

  Drake heard the sound of the Elf running, and then Ash firing his weapon and he knew he was out of time.

  As Drake reached the stun pistol, his imagination had the Elf swinging his ax down at his back.

  Drake grabbed the stun gun and made one last turn to bring up the weapon. The Elf was still on his feet and only four meters away, but Ash's blaster fire seemed to have stopped him.

  Yet even as Drake brought his stunner up, the Elf seemed to recover just a bit and tried to move forward.

  Both Drake and Ash fired one more time.

  Drakes shot hit the Elf in the stomach, and Ash’s hit him at the top of his chest.

  The Elf fell to the ground in a way that suggested complete unconsciousness or death, with his ax slipping from his loose grip as he fell.

  Drake looked at the guard, who hadn’t been hit in the fight.

  “Ash, can you please check to see if either is alive?”

  The guard checked both men and could not find any signs of life. Ash stopped for just a second to pick up the dead Karurian’s pistol and put it in the back of his waistband.

  He just shook his head at Drake after checking the Karurian.

  At this point, Drake was about to pull out his medical kit when he remembered he was in a hospital.

  “Ash, see if you can find something I can use to treat my leg wound please,” Drake asked.

  After Ash had found Drake something to clean his wound, a local anesthetic, and some bandages, Drake cared for his injured leg.

  While Drake’s nanites went to work, the anesthetic would make using the leg easier.

  After treating his leg, Drake and Ash checked out the room the two men were trying to break into. Drake wasn’t surprised to find out that the room was occupied by the Dwarf he had captured a few days before.

  The door was damaged, but Drake thought that it would hold the Dwarf inside, even if he made a determined attempt to escape.

  As Drake looked into the room, the Dwarf looked drugged and not really aware of what was going on around him.

  When Drake asked Ash about the Dwarves condition, he responded that the staff sometimes had to medicate patients that were hard to deal with or suicidal.

  With the area cleared, Drake and Ash turned to head back out toward the emergency room section of the Hospital.

  Chapter 17 – Sadness

  Before heading out of the psychiatric ward of the hospital, Drake needed some more information.

  “Just a second Ash, I need to ask a friend a question,” said Drake.

  “Samantha, how long do you think it will take before the A.I. can brainwash more people into working for it?” asked Drake.

  “When we found out that we were dealing with someone who used mental conditioning, I looked up some information on the subject. The time it takes to fully condition a person varies based on the individual’s mental stability and resistance to suggestion. But the A.I. could start getting results in just a few hours. Anything less would just leave it with someone too shocked by the treatment to cooperate. Full conditioning could take days to complete, though,” said Samantha.

  “You estimated that the van they used could only hold six to eight people, right? Did that include the droid you mentioned? If so, are we down to three to five people, one droid and one A.I.?” asked Drake.

  “I would agree that we likely have three to five people left to deal with, but depending on what the hospital has in the way of droids and bots, we might have a lot to get through to get to the A.I. still.” replied Samantha.

  Drake looked at Ash, “You know this hospital better than I do. The direct approach leads up past the emergency registration and waiting rooms. That’s the approach you tried last right?”

  “Yes, and where we lost Doreen.” The guard confirmed.

  “But I looked at the floor map, and there’s a back way through imaging… Where do you think the A.I. would feel safest? It would have to be somewhere where it could connect to a data jack and power… Is there some office area in that section that you might consider safe?” Drake asked Ash.

  “Maybe… I need to look at a map.”

  “Samantha?” asked Drake, “Can you display a map?”

  “Yes, but it won’t be as detailed as a true holo-display, or your helmet’s display.” replied Samantha.

  With that, Samantha projected a blue map from the data bracer. The map displayed the floor layout in shades of blue.

  “You see this area here southwest of the registration desk… You can see that there’s just the one hallway into this section, it can only be reached by going through the emergency room area. This is the furthest area from any entrance into the emergency department. Its office space, so it would have power and data jacks.” said Ash.

  Drake examined the map and had to agree that it was the most likely area.

  “How about this section in the southeast corner though?” Drake asked. He agreed with Ash, but he also found an area on the map that looked almost as good from the perspective of the enemy.

  “You can’t see it on this map, but that section is mostly storage. It doesn’t have any data access.” replied the guard. “And if the A.I. is in the office area, it’s going to be a battle to get to it.”

  Drake had an idea, “Maybe, or maybe not. What can you tell me about the buildings construction?”

  ***

  “Ok, so step one, we need to knock out the enemies eyes, which means taking out all the cameras in these halls and anything electronic that has optical or audio pickups. Where ever we can, we’ll just unplug equipment, like in these areas of the imaging department.”

  “Step two; we plant my distractions in these two areas, hoping to draw their attention.”

  “Then after a few minutes, we�
�re going in through this section. Drake pointed to an area in the imaging department.” Drake finished outlining his plan to Ash and waited for a response.

  “It might work, but I hope we find more guards soon. I would feel better with a little more help,” replied Ash.

  “Well, let’s take out the cameras in these halls and look for help while we’re at it. Were there any other… what did you call it… rally points in this section?” asked Drake.

  “Yes, this stair area here, but it’s in the line of site of the emergency waiting area…” said Ash.

  “Well, we need to kill the cameras in that hall, so will look and see if there are any guards in the stair area, ok?” asked Drake.

  After a nod of agreement from Ash, Drake continued, “Good, we only have about another hour or so before the A.I. conditions its first reinforcements.”

  Drake and Ash headed back out into the main north-south hall of the hospital and after looking both ways, headed south. The next camera they came across was mounted at the next hallway crossing, the one that led east into the emergency room, and was right next to the other set of stairs to this floor.

  Drake took out the camera with a shot from his blaster, which was becoming his preferred weapon for this mission, after coming close to dying in the last confrontation.

  “I’ll cover the corridor to the East, check the stairs and around the loop to the west there.” Drake directed.

  Drake waited, and after Ash had nodded his confirmation, he took up his position.

  While Ash was busy, Drake covered the empty hall to the east. Drake could see another camera down near the Emergency entrance, about seventy meters away. Since he had nothing else to do, while waiting for Ash, Drake decided to try to take out that camera.

  The camera was the size of a baseball, and would make a hard target to hit from so far away. At some point Drake wanted the A.I. to believe that he might be making an assault down this hall, so a little target practice served two purposes.

  It took Drake four shots to clip the camera. Since he wasn’t confident it was knocked out, and there was still no activity down the hall, Drake continued firing and managed a solid hit that destroyed the camera on his sixth shot.