by G J Ogden
“You two go ahead. I can barely move with this damn busted-up knee,” Cad called out as the crack of Alexis’ pistols and boom of Draga’s shotgun resounded along the corridor.
The passage was soon littered with the bodies of dead renegades, and Cad struggled over them to push through into the main operations center. As he stepped inside, Cad let out a low whistle, once again impressed by the inventive use of mothballed starships to create an operational base. The main command center appeared to be a combination of two heavy freighter bridge sections, bolted and welded together. It was as if they’d been fused in a head-on collision that had accidentally merged the two ships into one.
He saw Alexis and Draga push ahead, pursuing the remaining renegades into sections adjoining the operations center. Cad remained in the central command area, unable to match his companions’ rapid progress. However, for once, Cad didn’t mind missing out on a bit of combat. He was curious to see how the DIY-built base functioned, and what he could potentially learn from its computer systems.
Placing his pistol down on one of the terminals, Cad tried to access the base’s core operating system, but the interface was securely locked down. He considered calling for Alexis to come back and work her magic, but he figured it could wait until the renegades had all been dealt with. He was about to head off after the others, when a distant, percussive thud distracted him. He grabbed his pistol and listened again, hearing the rhythmic thud, thud, thud grow louder and closer. Moving around the computer terminal, he headed to the rear of the operations center, toward the source of the sound. Cad pressed his back to the wall next to a closed door and held his pistol ready, intending to shoot whatever came through at point-blank range. Then the noise suddenly stopped.
Damn it, Cad, just wait for the others… he told himself, knowing that caution was the sensible course of action. However, his own ego urged him to open the door and face whatever was behind it alone. He didn’t want Draga to think him weak for calling in backup or to provide Alexis with anything she could use to tease him about later.
Taking a deep breath, Cad readied himself, then slammed the door release before bursting through the opening. The next thing he knew, Cad was sailing through the air, back into the operations center. It was like a mule had just kicked him in the chest. Cad collided with the computer terminal he’d examined seconds earlier and crumbled to the deck, struggling for breath. His visor flickered wildly, but it functioned well enough for Cad to see that the entire chest section of his armor was now bathed in red. He gritted his teeth and prepared to stand, but before he’d moved a muscle, he saw a combat bot emerge from the open door and march purposefully toward him.
Cad pushed himself to his feet, adrenaline surging through his veins, and fired at the approaching bot. Bullets pinged off its armored body, but Cad’s weapon lacked the power to stop the formidable combat machine in its tracks. He threw down the pistol and met it face on, landing a solid right cross into the bot’s faceless cranial unit. The machine staggered back, and Cad followed, hammering another two blows into its metal torso before gearing up to launch a kick. However, as he tried to swing his leg toward the bot, his damaged right knee froze again, leaving him open and vulnerable. The machine seized its chance to attack, swinging its heavy metal arm at Cad like a club. Cad was hit hard and propelled several meters through the air again, before landing hard against another console. He groaned as pain flooded his body and alarms rang out inside his helmet. The HUD in his visor was malfunctioning severely now, but he saw enough to know that his right arm and shoulder were shot.
The combat bot turned and pursued as Cad scrambled to his feet before rolling back over the top of the console, a second before the machine’s arm smashed through the metal apparatus as if it were made of cardboard. The bot’s arm then became stuck in the mangled and twisted mass of circuits, conduits, and panels, giving Cad vital seconds to compose himself. It was all that he needed.
Cad stood tall and pulled off his helmet, discarding it to his side like a piece of trash. He was hurting and flustered, but he was unafraid, and – more importantly – enraged. Reaching over to his damaged right shoulder with his still-functioning left arm, Cad ripped the armor away, as if he were tearing away necrotic flesh. He then hammered and clawed at his damaged knee to loosen the joint and give himself the freedom to move again. In the time it took to do that, the combat bot had managed to pull its arm free of the smashed console, which crackled and sparked with residual energy, and resumed its relentless advance toward Cad. In many ways, he admired the automated fighting machine. It felt no fear or remorse, and it could not be distracted or deterred from its mission. It was a killer, pure and simple. Yet it also lacked a vital element. It was an element that Cad possessed in abundance; an unquenchable thirst to survive and to win.
Cad drew his Black Prince sword with his now unencumbered right hand and yelled at the bot, urging it on. He knew that taunting the machine was pointless; it could not be goaded or offended. Getting angry at it was like getting angry at a hammer if you hit your own thumb. Cad didn’t care – the bot had gotten the better of him once, and now it would pay the price, the same as all those that dared to cross swords with him.
The combat bot advanced, but Cad dodged back and swung his sword, slicing the machine’s arm off at the elbow joint. The Black Prince sword may have been a medieval design, but it had been forged from a metal that would have seemed magical to anyone from Edward of Woodstock’s time. If Excalibur had been more than a mere myth, Cad’s sword would easily have been its equal.
Hydraulic fluid spurted from the bot’s wound like blood, but Cad gave the machine no quarter. Stepping in, he removed the automaton’s other arm before spinning around and slicing its faceless cranial unit from its body with the skill of a master headsman.
The combat bot fell to the deck, dismembered and defeated. Cad aimed the tip of the blade at its torso and stared down imperiously at his fallen foe.
“Are you quite finished slaughtering robots?”
Cad turned around to see Alexis and Draga at the top end of the operations center; both had their face masks retracted. There was a late middle-aged man by Draga’s feet; she was holding him firmly by a thick tuft of his hair.
“Is there anyone else left to kill?” Cad asked, walking toward them as best he could, given the dilapidated state of his armor.
“Just this guy,” Alexis continued, pointing to the white-haired man, who looked to be only partly conscious. “He’s the base commander.”
Cad smiled and nodded approvingly before turning his attention to Draga. Her iridescent armor was wet with blood, though considering the severe level of damage that she’d also sustained, Cad couldn’t be sure how much of it was her own. “I’m impressed that you managed to restrain yourself enough to leave someone alive.”
Draga shrugged. “This was fun. I want to find another base so we can do it again.”
Cad sighed, but then winced as pain again shot through his body. “I’m glad you were entertained, Draga, but we won’t last long taking on every renegade base on foot like this. We’re going to need some much heavier firepower.” Then he looked at the disheveled state of his own armor and added, “And quite a few spare parts too.”
“I’ll get the prisoner stowed away on my ship,” said Draga, and Cad nodded before she moved off, dragging the semi-conscious renegade commander by the hair. It looked like the stereotypical cartoon image of a caveman dragging a woman behind him, except in this case, the roles were reversed.
Alexis holstered her pistols, then hurried over to Cad to check his wounds. With Draga gone, she had allowed herself to show her concern.
“I’m fine, don’t fuss,” said Cad, trying to brush her off, but Alexis raised her eyebrows at him, squeezing a fist to his ribs. Cad recoiled and yelped in pain.
“Fine, my ass,” said Alexis. “Let’s get you back to the ship so I can deal with these wounds.”
Cad saw the blood leaking from Alexis’ armor
and knelt down to check it out. “You first,” he said, feeling a swell of panic rise up inside him. “Then I’ll let you sort me out.”
“Promises, promises…” replied Alexis with a wink. With all the threats in the base dealt with, Alexis’ more playful side was already reasserting itself. She then moved toward the exit, but Cad didn’t follow.
“I’ll be there in a minute; there’s something I need to do first,” said Cad, resting on a nearby console to take some of the weight off his aching legs.
“And what’s that?” Alexis replied. “Besides bleeding out all over the deck, that is?”
Cad met her eyes then sheathed his Black Prince sword. “I need to leave a message for our other renegade friends who escaped from us at the Consortium HQ.”
Alexis frowned. “You think they’ll come here?”
“They’ll come,” said Cad confidently. “And when they do, I’ll invite them to meet us again, face to face.”
“Why the hell do you want to meet them again?” said Alexis.
“Because I want to know my enemy,” replied Cad with a sudden, fierce grit. “I also want them to know me. I want them to know the face of the man who’s better than them, and who is going to kill them.”
26
The outer doors to the hangar bay of the renegade hideout opened and Dakota Wulfrun eased her fighter craft inside. Hallam remained ever vigilant in the second seat, scouring the space around them with his eyes and the ship’s scanners, looking for any sign of an ambush. However, the Darkspace surrounding the renegade hideout had been as deathly silent as the base itself. They’d received no answer to their many hails, and besides the movement of the bay doors and the observant tracking of the sentry turrets, the base was utterly still.
The inner airlock pressurized and the doors opened into the main hangar area. “At least the hideout still has power,” said Dakota as she maneuvered the fighter to a landing pad.
Dakota remained hopeful, but Hallam hadn’t yet seen any reason for optimism. “I’m not sure that’s a good thing,” he answered, peering around the strangely empty hangar. “Why would Cad Rikkard leave the base intact, even if he’s killed everyone inside? It’s too valuable an asset to just abandon.”
The fighter thudded onto the deck and the whine of its main engines began to diminish as Dakota powered them down.
“We don’t know that everyone is dead,” said Dakota. She was trying to sound positive, but Hallam was naturally more cynical. Something about the situation seemed off.
“Well, let’s find out.” Hallam unclipped his harness, pushed himself out of his seat, and drew his weapon. “But let’s assume the worst and hope for the best, okay?”
Hallam could see that Dakota was uncomfortable with such a “glass-half-empty” philosophy, but she didn’t argue. Deep down, Hallam knew that Dakota shared his fears that everyone on the base had been slaughtered by the Blackfire Squadron. She just couldn't admit it until she was forced to confront the cold, hard truth with her own eyes.
“Let me head out first,” said Dakota, sliding ahead of Hallam. “The base’s biometric scanners will recognize me and allow us through the locked-down doors.”
Hallam nodded and followed Dakota out of the fighter’s lowered rear ramp to the deck of the hangar bay. He was wearing the same black armored flight suit that Dakota had sported when she rescued him from the rooftop of the Consortium HQ. It was lightweight, but also offered limited protection, focusing on the torso, shoulders, forearms, thighs, and knees, in addition to the sleek helmet. However, should they meet any resistance, he accepted that some armor was better than nothing.
Dakota ran across the deserted hangar, which Hallam noted was bereft of any vessels other than their own, and began working on the door leading into the main complex. She then stepped back, drew her pistol, and nodded to Hallam. Both took positions on opposite sides of the frame, and Dakota hit the door release, causing a thick slab of metal to slide upwards with a throaty whir. Dakota nodded again and Hallam moved through first with Dakota close behind, moving to the opposite side. They continued on in this way, clearing the various briefing rooms and engineering spaces adjacent to the hangar, finding no one, alive or dead, until they reached the main foyer. Then Hallam saw the bodies, and he understood why the base was so still.
Dakota lowered her weapon and was about to run out to the nearest corpse, but Hallam stepped in and blocked her path. “Hold up, Dak, we need to clear the room first. We don’t know what they could have left behind.”
However, Dakota just brushed past him, her face a twisted mix of grief and rage. “We know exactly what they’ve left behind, Hal,” she replied, her words coming out with an acid bite. “They’ve left death behind.”
Hallam felt his stomach flutter as Dakota raced ahead into the center of the foyer, taking no precautions against potential threats, human or remote. He rushed after her, quickly checking the corners and the upper levels as best he could, but the expected ambush didn’t come. He backed up next to Dakota, who was kneeling at the side of a middle-aged man with a brutal shotgun wound to his upper chest.
“Draga Vex…” said Dakota, letting the words seep from her lips like poisonous gas. “This is her calling card; the psycho always uses a shotgun.”
Hallam counted five more bodies in the foyer before spotting a trail of blood leading through a large double door.
“I think they went through there.” He nodded toward the opening.
“Yes, that’s the operations center,” said Dakota, letting out a heavy sigh. “I expect we’ll just find more of the same in there.”
Hallam again looked at the body of the man before meeting Dakota’s eyes. “Did you know him?”
“No,” Dakota answered straight away, though she didn’t look at the body again. “Besides a few key commanders, we all remain anonymous. We even limit face-to-face contact with others on our own bases to those within our immediate circle. It helps to protect as many of us as possible, if anyone is captured.”
Hallam hadn’t even considered until that point that Cad and his crew may have taken prisoners. “Hopefully, that strategy will help safeguard the other bases,” he said, “assuming that madman restrained himself enough to leave anyone alive to capture.”
Dakota set off toward the operations center and Hallam walked by her side. Neither had fully lowered their guard, but he could sense that Dakota had now accepted the likely fate of the hideout. Her shoulders had dropped and the brightness in her eyes was gone. It was difficult to see her like this, Hallam realized in that moment. Dakota had always been so vibrant, and was usually the one person who could lift the fog from any troubled mind. This time, however, the gloom was too dark even for Dakota’s light to shine through.
They both stepped over the bodies of other fallen renegades as reverently as possible, and entered the main operations command center. Dakota went over to the primary command console, while Hallam walked the perimeter, checking each body in turn, in the vain hope that someone might still be alive. Hallam’s heart leapt in his chest as he saw what looked like a severed head, but the panic soon subsided when he realized that it was mechanical in nature, rather than organic.
“What the hell kind of weapon can slice off a combat bot’s cranial unit?” he wondered, holding up the robotic head. There was damage to its frontal section, as if the machine had been whacked with a heavy metal bar or slammed face first into a wall.
“Cad Rikkard,” answered Dakota, as she worked on the now-activated console. She then met Hallam’s confused eyes and added, “The asshole carries a sword, remember?”
Hallam shuddered and dropped the cranial unit, which landed with a metallic clank before rolling away under a desk. He then found the combat bot’s body, minus two severed arms.
“I hope to hell this machine is the only thing he used that sword on,” he added, unsure of whether he could stomach the sort of blood bath that might await them in the rest of the base.
“I wouldn’t count on
it,” replied Dakota darkly. “Those erratic combat bots are a last resort; if that thing got released, then it was because the base commander assumed the battle was lost.”
Hallam nodded again. He’d learned about the various models of combat bots and warbots at the CSF academy. Humanity had accomplished many things, but creating an intelligent artificial brain was not one of them. Bots had once been used on the front-lines to fight Earth’s still frequent conflicts, in addition to combating criminal gangs on the bridge worlds. However, the machines were unable to make reasoned ethical choices, and often unable to discern friend from foe. In short, they were often more of a threat than the enemy you were fighting. They were now illegal on all worlds, besides Damien Doyle’s own planet of Vesta. Dakota was right; for a combat bot to have been let loose on the renegade base, the situation must have been frantic and desperate. However, perhaps even more unsettling was the ease with which Cad Rikkard had seemingly dealt with the volatile but deadly machine.
“Unbelievable…” said Dakota, hammering her palms on the console.
Hallam halted his circuit of the operations center and moved to Dakota’s side. “More unbelievable than what we’ve already seen?”
Dakota huffed a dismayed laugh, then extended her hand toward the console’s screen. “See for yourself. Cad Rikkard has left us a little message.”
Hallam frowned and leaned in to look at the screen, aping Dakota’s earlier, incredulous huff almost exactly. He read the message, shaking his head in disbelief the whole time, but then noticed there was a holo recording too.
“I need to hear this from the horse’s mouth,” said Hallam, tapping the screen.
“Don’t be surprised if I put a bullet through his holographic face…” snarled Dakota as the image of Cad Rikkard appeared in front of them.
“Hello, Mr. Knight,” spoke the image of Cad Rikkard in an oddly congenial tone. Even in holographic form, Hallam wanted to slap the arrogant smirk off his face. “First of all, I want to congratulate you for not dying after we sabotaged your armored tanker, and also for making it off Vesta alive. That makes it twice you’ve crossed swords with me and lived. For the record, that’s two times more than most people. There will not be a third.”
