"Yes sir!" Bort and Dort both said at the same time, saluting him.
He tapped on his neck below his left ear. "Comms check." he said.
"I read you." Amaya said in his ear.
Bort, Dort, and Too'Zer did the check as well, each was able to hear everything anyone on their channel said.
"It's almost guaranteed he knows we're coming, so watch your backs. Complete your missions and get back to the ship as fast as possible." Dan said as Too'Zer reached for the airlock's control. He looked at each of his men in turn, and they each nodded to him as affirmation they would follow his orders. "Amaya, you're in charge of this ship, activate the internal defense system and keep the door open for us as long as you can. If it comes to it, close the hatch and run if you're in danger of being overrun." He paused for a moment. "And don't blow up my ship if you can help it."
Watts swung down from the ceiling and landed beside Dan. For as little as he was, he had pistols in two of his hands, and his console attached to his missing arm. He carried a backpack which Dan saw had shorter version of a rifle sticking out of it. He also had on glasses that looked like they had a computer in them. He looked like he was going to fight a war.
"What do you think you're doing?" Dan asked him.
"He killed Twang, I'll kill him." He looked around. "Besides, I can access the systems faster than these two." He said as he pointed to Bort and Dort with a hairy thumb.
"Fine, just remember the mission. Ensuring the station doesn't crash into the capital is the first priority." Dan said, then looked to Too'Zer to open then airlock. He raised his rifle. The rest of his crew followed suit.
"Wanna' bet who makes it back alive?" Bort asked.
Everyone looked at Dan, including Too’Zer, who waited to open the airlock. "Kind of messed up, don't you think?" Dan said as he lowered his rifle.
"I'm in." Watts said quickly.
Dan shook his head. "Belladi, set it up." He said.
"Betting opens for three minutes... now." She told them through their communicators.
Everyone put in a bet, even Dan. He looked around and waited for everyone to finish. "We good?" He asked. When everyone nodded, he raised his rifle and gave the signal to Too'Zer
The Airlock opened to an empty hallway, lit by lights embedded into the ceiling. Every ten feet were bulkheads, and Dan and his team moved up in military precision to each one, the rear man advancing to the front - only one man in the hallway, without cover, at any time. They did this until the came up to the first hallway. This part of the station was used for VIP access, so there were no security checkpoints or man-traps built into the hallways.
Dan looked peeked down the two side hallways, then looked back towards his team. This is where they would split up. He pointed at Watts, Bort, and Dort and then pointed to the hallway on the right. He covered them while they moved quickly, using the same strategy they had used up until this point. He then pointed to Too’Zer and pointed down the other hallway.
Too’Zer nodded and proceeded alone down the opposite hallway Watts and the twins moved down. Dan watched all his men move down both hallways until they disappeared around bends before he himself moved forward to the center hallway. The minute he moved into the next hallway, an airlock door slammed down from the ceiling behind him. He had memorized the station's defenses and had expected this. Hopefully the guns wouldn't descend.
There was no turning back now.
* * * * *
Dan looked at the door behind him, then looked down the empty hallway in front of him. Amaya was right, Kirk didn't want to kill him. So, he did something he would never do in a tactical situation - he stepped out in the middle of the hallway and confidently strolled down it.
Nothing happened.
He lowered his rifle and let it hang from the strap around his shoulder as he walked towards the elevator, but he did keep his left hand on his pistol - force of habit, he supposed. The elevator dinged and opened as he approached, and he walked in, turned around and waited.
The doors closed and the elevator started moving. This was one of the newer elevators in the UPA, so you couldn't feel it move, but with his implants he knew it was. The specific implant that told him so was still embedded in his ear. Other than telling him when his body was in motion, it also helped keep him balanced when others would stumble or fall.
It took a few minutes, but the elevator finally stopped on the top floor, the observatory, which was where he had projected himself to talk to Kirk before.
When the door finally opened, he stepped out onto the observatory deck and saw Kirk. He looked different than in his projections. His shoulders were slumped. Dan could hear his raspy breathing from half the room away. When Kirk turned around, he moved so slowly that Dan thought he might fall over before he made the half-turn. His hood fell over his entire face, so Dan couldn't see it at all.
"Hello Trevor." Kirk said. His voice was much raspier than his metallic voice that Dan had heard when they were using their implants. Kirk coughed, sounding like death and holding his fist to his mouth.
"Kirk." Dan acknowledged. He took a step back when three little robots drove out from under Kirk's robe.
"They won't hurt you." Kirk coughed.
The little robots rolled around Dan and shot lasers at him.
"Scanning me?" Dan asked.
"Yes."
"What for?" He said as he moved his hands to his rifle.
"I want to know how you did it." He said, having a coughing fit.
"How I did what?" He asked, pointing his rifle at one of the robots.
"How you made it work..." One of the little robots said in a mechanical voice while Kirk coughed, almost uncontrollably.
"How I made what work?" Dan asked.
"How you have the implants and are in perfect health." The robot said as Kirk's coughing fit subsided.
Dan backed up and raised his rifle. "You brought me here to use as a lab rat?"
"I have to know how it works." The robot said, following him.
"Back the robots up, or they get blasted into a million pieces." Dan said as he took another step back.
"The battery in your gun only provides one-hundred shots at its lowest setting." Another robot said from behind him.
Dan jumped a little and looked around, pointing his rifle at it.
Hundreds of robots were now moving from the edge of the walls, and some were even moving down the glass from the giant dome above him.
"I have to know how it works." The robots all said in unison.
Chapter 11
"Watts, what's your status?" Amaya asked in his ear.
"Still alive, though not for the station's attempts." He said as he dangled off of a broken laser hanging from the ceiling. He had just rewired the power conduit that they had shot up and turned it to fire at the other station defenses, blowing them apart with each hit.
"And the others?" Amaya asked.
"Dan's gone off alone, Too’Zer’s gone off alone, and the twins are with me - though we're only moving about a foot every couple minutes because of the defenses." He shouted as sparks started to fly from his patchwork laser. He jumped down to the floor before it exploded and moved behind a bulkhead before the other lasers could hit him. He looked back at Bort and Dort, who were similarly pinned behind a bulkhead firing madly at the remaining lasers.
"Can you hack the defenses?" She asked.
"A little hard at the moment." He yelled as he lobbed an EMP grenade down the hallway to disrupt the other lasers. It blew up with a purple flare and the next five lasers went dormant.
Bort and Dort stepped out and took aim, taking them down easily with no return fire.
Finally, the hallway was clear, and Bort and Dort almost stepped into the elevator.
"Whoa there, fellas. I wouldn't use the elevator unless you have a death wish." Watts told them as he jumped in front of them.
He popped open a panel next to the elevator to reveal a maintenance shaft big enough for one human a
t a time. He peeked in, looking up and down. "Are there defenses in the maintenance shafts?" He asked over his comms.
"Not in that part of the station." Amaya replied.
"Then down we go, four floors to the generators, boys." Watts said as he climbed in.
Bort and Dort had to finagle their rifles above their heads to be able to fit, as they a little larger than 'average humans'.
Watts slid down the rails of the ladder, his hands were tough enough that it didn't bother him. He kicked open the panel and peeked out. Seeing the station's engine room, he looked up and yelled to the twins. "Hurry up, we don't have a lot of time!"
He jumped out and quickly ran, in his way, across the floor to one of the engineering consoles. He unscrewed one of the panels at the base and threw it aside, not caring about being stealthy. He pulled a cable from his backpack and connected it from his wrist console to a port inside the engineering console. After tapping a few buttons on his console, he smiled and yelled "I'm in!".
Bort was the first down the ladder and was attempting to squeeze through the small maintenance opening. Watts could hear him shouting to his brother to back up.
Watts was tapping furiously, first dropping in the backdoor that would give Amaya access to the entire station, then moving on to disable all the wireless access points across the station, except for the one Amaya was using. He was close to finishing when Bort and Dort finally made it into the room and were hurrying to put the panel back over the maintenance shaft.
"What are you doing, you idiots!" Watts yelled at them as he looked up. "That's our only way out!"
"Robots, lots of 'em, coming down the shaft!" Bort yelled quickly as they put the plate over the shaft. Bort held it as Dort twisted the locks in place. They could hear metal scraping against metal.
"Amaya!" Watts said as he went back to work. "What's the subroutine for the robots in the maintenance shaft?"
"What robots?" Amaya said. "The station doesn't have robots."
"Great, so now the bad guy has tiny robots moving around the station? As if we didn't have enough to deal with." He muttered as he finished disabling the wireless access points.
"I have control." Amaya said. "Hold on, let me scan for moving electrical signals."
"Oh no." Belladi said in their ears.
"I don't like the sound of that..." Watts said. "What is it?" He said as he looked around the panel he was jacked into to check if any of the little robots made it through the maintenance shaft.
"There are thousands of moving signals in the station." Amaya said. "And the elevator is heading down from the observatory deck, with about thirty of them in there."
"Incoming elevator!" Watts shouted at the twins. He didn't know why he shouted it to them, they were on the same channel he was and could hear everything she said.
The twins, to their credit, pulled out their rifles and took up positions behind a couple of other consoles in the middle of the room that would give them cover while still providing a complete view of the elevator.
Watts considered helping, but instead used his wrist-console to start frying circuits around the engines so the enemy couldn't access them. He turned them off, readjusted them to change the station's trajectory, and then turned them on full blast. Everyone could feel the station move - even with the internal stabilizers.
"Watts! What did you do?!" Amaya yelled in his ear.
"Stopped the station from landing on the capital."
"Yeah, and also you just broke the docking seal!" She screamed in his ear. "You have no escape now!"
"Just re-dock, he already knows we're here." Watts said.
"We're not experienced enough to dock a moving target, unless you think Dan will be okay with us breaking his ship!" She told him in exasperation.
"Well, then I guess we hold out. Keep the ship close, we may need a pick-up later." He said as the elevator doors opened.
The elevator dinged and the doors opened.
Lasers immediately fired in both directions.
* * * * *
Dan pulled out an EMP grenade and held it up. "Since you're part robot, I know this will hurt you."
The thousands of little robots stopped moving towards him all at once. It was creepy looking.
"It will hurt you as well." One of the little robots near his feet said.
"I took out the implants that would kill me if they stopped. It might fry the others, but I rarely use them anyways." Dan told him.
"I doubt that." The little robot said. "You still have the delta-zero-eight next to your heart. When that stops, your heart stops."
Dan paused, long enough to consider his words. He wondered if Kirk was lying and decided to play along. "Worth it, so long as you die with me." he said.
Kirk ambled forward a few steps. His robots cleared a path for him. He stopped when Dan moved the hand with the grenade towards him.
"Don't do it." Dan threatened.
"Very well." Kirk said as he turned slowly and walked back to the center of the room. "Your friends have been more successful than I could have imagined. They locked me out of the engine and navigation control." He turned around when he got to the center of the observatory. "Unfortunately for them, they haven't disabled the subspace access points in the missiles, which I've armed while we were talking."
He lifted his head, and for the first time, Dan could see under the hood. Very pale and withered skin which looked metallic, with implants covering his face and neck. His eyes were replaced by some sort of implant that Dan wasn't familiar with. He could see the implant over his throat though, and he assumed that's why it was hard for him to talk.
"Tell me Trevor, will you sacrifice your crew, or the capital below?" He asked, this time not using the robot.
New Geneva, at the last census, had just over forty-two million people in it. He had checked before coming here. Dan scratched his neck with his free hand. “My crew is prepared to save the lives of millions - even at the risk of their own life." Dan told him confidently. "The arming of all the missiles on board this station won't mean jack, since it will save them."
"Drop the grenade, or I'll fire the missiles at New Geneva - killing the millions of people you're hoping to save." Kirk said through the robot next to his feet. He had a coughing fit which prevented him from talking. "All I want is to study you, so that I might live."
"So, I get dissected to save a murderer?" Dan asked. "I don't think so." He said as he slid the panel on the grenade open and held the trigger with his thumb.
"Dissect you?" Kirk laughed, or tried to, but he coughed instead. "I have technology that can study you without dissecting you. It will be minimally invasive, and you, your friends, and your ship can leave safely." The robot told him.
"And the people on Beta?" Dan asked. The light on the grenade was flashing now. He had held it long enough that the dead man switch was active. If the button lifts, the EMP grenade detonates and fries everything electrical in thirty feet. He wondered if Kirk was telling him the truth about his heart implant.
"Well they die, of course."
"No deal." Dan said, preparing to lift his thumb off the grenade.
Chapter 12
"Watts!" Amaya said into the comms. "You need to disable the missiles immediately!"
"Yes, I know, we all heard the Captain." Watts said. Laser fire and cursing could be heard over the channel. "Where are the weapons stored?" He asked with a grunt.
"You okay?" Amaya asked from the bridge. Belladi looked at her with concern.
"Just a scratch - these damned robots are everywhere!" She heard him shout.
"I'm updating your map with the locations of all the missiles." She said as she tapped on the console at the Captain's Chair of the Heatseeker.
"There's no way we can make it to all those locations!" Watts yelled at her.
"You have to, the people on Beta are counting on you!" Amaya pleaded with him.
"We'll get to as many as we can!" Watts yelled into his comms.
Belladi monitored their progress through the new connection to the station that Watts had set up. She now had access to all the internal sensors. "First Officer, I can't find Too’Zer with the sensors."
"You won't, he's a Drogant. Their rock-like skin blocks sensors."
"How will we know if he's okay? He's gone radio-silent." She said, worried about her crew mate.
"We'll have to assume he knows what he's doing." Amaya told her as she accessed the ship's navigation controls.
"The only propulsion we have is the oxygen tanks, so what are you doing?" Belladi asked as she noticed Amaya accessing navigation. Dan had privately asked her to watch over the Space Admiral regarding his ship.
Amaya noticed that she noticed and looked back. "We need to fire up the test engine." She said as she turned on the new engine. Her access as First Officer gave her full control of the Heatseeker."
"Won't that give our position away?" Belladi asked, confused.
"The enemy already knows our location." She said.
"How can you know that?" Belladi asked.
"Because he let us dock. Part of the training plan for Dan and Kirk was war-time advanced strategies. In the strategies, if you can take the enemy out from afar, you do it, regardless of the situation." She said as she monitored the test engine's start-up. "Four minutes until the engine is online."
"Space Admiral." Lieutenant Melton said over the comms. "The engine just started coming on-line."
"That was me." She replied. She had almost forgotten he was in the engine room.
"That seems... heartless." Belladi said as she activated the ships defenses.
"What are you doing?" Amaya asked. "And why is it heartless?" She said as she looked towards the other woman.
"It's heartless because you have no idea who is on that enemy ship. There could be children." She said without looking up. "And I'm arming the defenses because I have a good feeling we're going to need them." She looked up to the front window as the shield slid down over it. The same shields that protected them from heat were also good at shielding them from lasers and explosions - though not as good as UPA armor, Dan considered the ability to hide inside of stars better than a true firefight. Plus, Watts had rebuilt the weapons so that they would fire from inside the star - but their ability to target through the star was still impeded. They've never tested the new ability.
Captain Dan Saves Beta Earth Page 9
