Somewhere deep in the core of the space station, an access panel rattled. After a second, it rattled again. Finally, after a scrabbling sound, it burst from the wall and a furry form tumbled to the floor of a dimly-lit chamber. The air was stifling, even with massive fans running at deafening levels. It was a server room, about the size of Lex's bachelor apartment. Monolithic servers were spaced across the floor like tombstones in a graveyard, blinking lights and diagnostic screens flowing faintly. There were no guards in the room, or anywhere near it. Being as deep inside the station as it was, it was seldom even considered necessary to run a patrol past it. Of course, there usually wouldn't be a threat able to squeeze in through the wiring trough.
Ma got to her feet and trotted to the foremost server. She locked her eyes on the screen and concentrated, attempting to access the server with her data connection. With a beep, the screen displayed a message: “Requested action unavailable over wireless connection. Please attach command module to physical data port and try again.”
Her eyes darted across the front of the device, eventually spotting a data connection. Her mind entered various parameters into her decision-making matrix. It came up with a depressingly low confidence value. With a tilt of her head, she concluded that in the absence of an alternative, this was still the best course of action.
“Attention, Lex, Garotte, and Silo. Please state status,” she broadcast.
“Bloody busy!” Garotte growled.
“These guys are gosh-darned dedicated to protecting this weapons bay. Can't budge 'em an inch. At least we know we've got the right place,” Silo added. “This hallway is pretty shot up, too.”
“I've got Karter, but we're trapped in a big room with a weird machine,” Lex replied.
“I will attempt to shut down the computer system. To do so, I will need to go communication silent. At your earliest convenience, please fetch me from the computer core, marked on your maps. I will likely require aid,” Ma instructed.
“Why, what are you--” Lex began.
“Signing off,” Ma stated.
She closed the connection and struggled slightly, twisting her head and tugging at the straps holding the data radio in place until one snapped and the device rattled to the floor. With her teeth, she snagged the base of the plug and tugged it free. She stood on her hind legs and leaned against the front of the server, but the port was just out of her reach. Her brow furrowed. Crouching down, she waggled her tail, calculated the trajectory, and leaped. The well-measured hop just barely missed its mark. A second and third did the same. Finally, with a huff of breath, she leapt one last time, and managed to click the wire in place. There was just enough slack to allow her to lie on the ground with the wire connected.
Now with a physical connection, Ma went to work. The encryption, even to get past the login screen, was astoundingly complex. She pushed the little organic brain for all that it was worth, churning through cyphers, keys, vulnerabilities, and everything else she calculated might gain her access. It was a terrible strain, and she began to shudder and shake violently as neurons worked at a capacity nature had never intended.
It was hopeless, but that didn't matter. It was the only option. She would make it succeed.
#
“By my count, we've got very little time left, my girl. This can't go on like this,” Garotte remarked.
The two professionals were crouched in a section of the space station that was barely recognizable as a corridor anymore. Constant hammering by friend and foe alike had reduced the walls, ceiling, and floor to scrap metal. There were no lights left, the glow from sputtering wires and plasma shots providing the only illumination. Sections of wall that were once bare, sturdy metal looked like discarded sandwich wrappers. If any of the walls had been space-facing, the whole battle would have been put to a sudden, airless end long ago. A badly damaged but still intact door provided protection behind the heroes, and a now-unrecognizable piece of machinery that had been knocked down during the early moments of the onslaught provided cover from the front.
“I don't think the grenade trick will work again. And a live grenade would probably result in lots of dead people, including us, without better cover,” she replied.
“Well, we need something to break the tie,” Garotte said. “Something that will . . .”
He stopped, because he realized that he was screaming, but he didn't have to be. The firing from the enemies had completely stopped. Before either could venture so much as a peek, however, a new sound came. It was a heavy, fast thumping, like boots pounding against the grating, but approaching far too quickly and hitting far too heavily. When Silo finally got her head out from cover to see what it was, she had a split second to react. One of the soldiers, equipped with a pair of Karter's boots, was surging forth at a completely inhuman speed. Silo threw out her arm and braced herself, delivering a textbook clothesline.
If one has never been on the receiving end of a clothesline--and few outside of the realm of professional wrestling have--then it is easy to overlook how punishing the maneuver can be, even under normal conditions. When the receiving end is moving about three times faster than a human being ought to, thanks to boots that will continue moving forward regardless of whether the feet inside of them are able to or not, the results are best left without description. Suffice to say that it starts with a savage impact, moves on to a lot of screaming and cracking, and ends with an unconscious target with legs that have more in common with noodles than limbs.
“Oh, golly,” Silo said, working her arm. “I just about threw my shoulder out on that one.”
“Lucky you. This fellow looks to have thrown out everything else,” Garotte said, dragging him behind cover as the shooting started again. “Pity he doesn't have one of those hefty guns.”
“I'll say. I'm itching to give one of those a try,” she said.
“Ah, but he does have one of those shields. This might be our break,” Garotte suggested, tugging the device and its controls from the unconscious soldier.
“And end up full of holes like that other guy? No, thanks.” Silo shuddered.
“It only happened because he fired the weapon.”
“Well, if we're going to be clearing those guys out of the way, we're going to have to do an awful lot of firing.”
“Fine, then. I shield, you fire,” Garotte decided, hooking on the device and activating it.
The protective field, which so far had only been associated with people who ended up motionless heaps, shimmered into being. With a deep breath, Garotte stepped out from cover and into the hail of bullets and energy bolts. A flutter of gold and a slight shimmer sent every last one of them rebounding back at the weapons that fired them. Garotte released the breath and turned to Silo.
“Coming, dear?” he said shakily.
Silo stepped out behind him, then dove desperately back behind cover when, after two quick strides, the shield generator lurched upward and nearly dislodged from his belt. With a few panicked motions, he secured it again, fortunately without any of the hail of ordinance getting through.
“What the heck was that!?” Silo objected.
“It would appear that, if I move too quickly, the shield repels the ground,” he observed. “In retrospect, this is probably why our fleet-footed friend didn't have it active.”
“Okay, then,” she said, stepping out again. “Make like a turtle.”
The pair trudged slowly forward, the shield doing its job and staying put.
“So far, so good,” Garotte said, flinching at a reflected round. He looked through the shield at the deadly light show that could kill him with even a single hiccup of his experimental protection. “Though, I must admit, I feel a trifle exposed.”
#
In the storage bay, Lex looked nervously at the door as it rattled and buckled under the attempts by the soldiers to tear it open, blow it up, or otherwise eliminate it.
“Karter, we really have to find a way to get out of here,” he said, reluctantly pulling the rifle from his back and aiming at the door.
“Busy,” Karter dismissed, fiddling with controls at a panel on the left side of the massive spherical cage.
“Busy what? Bleeding to death?” Lex said.
“It isn't that bad,” Karter countered, putting his hand to his wound. When he withdrew his hand and found it to be completely saturated with blood, as was most of the lower half of his jumpsuit, he paused for a moment. “Okay, that's a lot of blood. I'm gonna be a few pints low.” He considered this for a moment, then shrugged. “I'll deal with it later. About how wide is that corridor, you figure? Four meters?”
“What? One and a half, maybe. Listen, is this really relevant? Shouldn't we be--”
“We'll say two. Diameter set. Target set. Antimatter cartridge loaded.”
“Antimatter? What are you--”
“Engage.”
There was a shuddering clap, and a blinding flash of light. Lex shielded his eyes as a second burst of light surged through the room, followed immediately by another clap of thunder and a rush of air from behind him. His eyes were still covered when he realized the rattling of the door was gone. Slowly, he lowered his arm. Apparently the rattling was gone because the door was gone. A fair amount of the wall was gone, too, along with the wall on the opposite side of the corridor. And there were circular holes in the ceiling and floor, revealing the decks above and below. The edges of the missing sections were sharp and precise, with a concave curve to them. As he looked about, trying to take it all in, his eyes locked on to the end of his rifle, which was also missing. Gradually, his brain twisted and turned the missing pieces, and worked out that a perfect sphere had been removed. The soldiers who had been hammering on the door would have been inside said sphere.
“W-where did they go?” Lex asked.
“Beats me,” Karter said with a shrug. “I'm still figuring out the controls. Someplace else, anyway, which is where I wanted them to go. The hole is bigger than I expected.”
“This is a transporter?”
“This is the transporter,” Karter corrected. “Oh, there's the problem. It says radius, not diameter. Whoopsie.”
“Can it get us all on the ship? Or transport those missiles out of the weapons bay?” Lex asked.
“Nah. It needs one of these active carrier wave transmitters on the target,” he said, grabbing one from a rack by the console and throwing it to Lex. “Kind of like that one I tossed out the door before.”
“Well, then how did you transport them out of here?” he asked.
“There's six carrier transmitters flitting around outside the station. I targeted one of those. There's only five, now.”
“I think there are six enemy ships outside.”
“Well, there's only five now.”
“That'll make the exit a little easier, I guess. Speaking of which, I've got a spare space suit bundled up here, I need you to put it on so we can get out of here,” Lex said, releasing the rifle and stuffing Karter's gadget into one his suit's many pockets before tugging the bundle from his back.
“Later, busy,” Karter dismissed again.
Lex gritted his teeth and threw down the suit. “Fine. I'll go get Ma. She's the only one who I've ever seen talk any sense into you.”
“Ma's a computer, Lex.”
“Not right now she's not. Are you going to be okay here while I get her?”
“Let's see. Peace and quiet, a bunch of painkillers, and an experimental piece of apparatus? Yeah, I oughta be good for a while. Leave the grenades, though. You know, for self-defense.”
Lex nodded and tossed away his rifle, left the four remaining grenades, and dug the slidepad from his pocket. According to the point on the map Ma had sent, she would be one level down and a few intersections down the corridor. He leaped down through the convenient hole left by Karter's trial and error and rushed down the--fortunately--deserted hallway below. He found the indicated door and tried the handle, mysteriously discovering it to be unlocked. Inside, he found the rows of servers all whirring and clicking in a way that sounded wrong even to Lex's untrained ear. On the ground in front of the nearest of them was Ma.
The little creature was shuddering and jerking, eyes half-closed and legs splayed out. Her wire had been pulled from the front of the machine, and was lying loose on the floor beside the liberated data radio. The screen was at a red and black command prompt, and simply displayed the words “Connection Lost.”
“Oh, my god, Ma, are you all right!?” he exclaimed. He crouched down and shakily inserted the wire into the radio again, tucking it into her harness.
The funk's head turned vaguely toward him, as though it was being controlled by an inexperienced puppeteer. At first, there was only digital jitter on the radio's transmission, but it cleared enough for a voice to cut through.
“Lex . . .” came her reply. It was as through an audio technician had run it through every digital distortion effect he had in his toolbox. The syllable was barely coherent.
“Are you okay? What happened?”
“High . . . encryption . . . extreme . . . computational . . . effort . . . over . . . extended . . . capacity . . .”
“The encryption was too much? Are you going to be okay?”
“No . . . no . . . massive . . . data . . . corruption . . . program . . . integrity . . . failure . . .”
“What do I do?”
“Take . . . care . . . of . . . Squee . . .”
With this final statement, Ma jerked a final time and went limp, her breathing taking on the steady rhythm of sleep, and the transmission dropping to meaningless distortion, then silence.
“Ma . . .” Lex said, scooping up the little beast.
Lex hung his head. Something in his mind tried to remind him there was no reason to be sad. This creature wasn't dead. Ma, to the extent she could even be considered to be alive, still ran in her entirety on Big Sigma at this moment. Logically, he shouldn't feel an ounce of heaviness in his heart over the loss of the temporary subset of herself she'd sent to fetch him. Logic, though, came as small comfort while he cradled the motionless body of a creature that once spoke with the voice of a friend.
His expression hardened and he climbed to his feet.
“Open com Silo, Garotte,” he stated, managing to keep a tremor from his voice. “Guys. We just lost Ma. What is our status?”
#
In the embattled hallway, Garotte gave a reply. “One moment.”
They were practically on top of what remained of the soldiers defending the weapons bay door. The constant stream of reflected attacks had reduced their numbers considerably, and the well-aimed and well-timed cover fire offered by Silo whenever they attempted to use something that might punch through the shield had reduced them even more.
Silo clicked a fresh clip into her pistol, leaned out, and fired off a few precise shots, taking care of the final soldiers.
“Well, then--that's that,” Garotte said, dusting off his hands. “We're at the door. Applying shaped charges now.”
“Sorry, hon, out of shaped charges. Used them all up getting here,” Silo corrected. “And I'm afraid anything less controlled that would result in us having a very bad day, this being the weapons bay and all. I'm shocked we're still in one piece as it is, with all the shooting going on.”
“Ah. Well then, I'll just work at unlocking this then, shall I?”
“On my way,” Lex said. “Close com.”
A high-pitched whine came from the door that had protected their flank so faithfully, followed by a second, then an ear-splitting clank as the heavy door fell away and Commander Purcell marched through. She slipped something into her belt and held her pistol with the rescuers steadily in her sights. Behind her was a meager assemblage of soldiers, including her second-in-command.
Garotte quickly stood between the commander and Silo.
“As I'm the one with the shield, it looks like you'll be the one working on the door,” he muttered.
“Not my strong suit,” she said, holstering her weapon and going to work on the control panel for the door.
“I've always admired your ability to adapt,” he replied.
“Stop what you're doing or I will fire,” said Commander Purcell.
“I do wish you would, my dear,” Garotte taunted. “I've got one of your precious shields.”
Purcell continued to march forward, weapon raised.
“Ask your boys. Not much fun to fire on an active shield,” he continued.
“I'm aware of the details of the shield,” Purcell said, drawing closer. Long, slow strides were moving her with deceptive speed. “It was my decision to pursue their deployment.”
“Oh, good, then that fellow who punched himself full of his own bullets has you to thank. Good show,” he remarked.
“It is the danger of using the most advanced technology available.”
“I can't help but notice that you aren't using a shield yourself. No, that particular honor goes to the men and women under your command. How many of them have you gotten killed?”
“More soldiers by far have been killed by the reluctance of the modern military to become truly modern.”
“Oh, really? Cite your sources. Maybe we should take a poll of the crew. How many have you got left, a dozen or so? We'll put the rest down for 'Bad Technology Killed Me.'”
“You're trying to stall me. Stupid decision. You're the one on a time limit.” Purcell tapped her free hand to her communicator. “Tactical, status!”
“The download is finished. The CME Activators are fully commissioned and ready to deploy,” came the reply.
Silo doubled her efforts on the door lock.
“Load them into the launch tubes and tell me when you are ready to fire.”
“Yes, Commander.”
Purcell smiled and continued her march. There were barely a dozen strides between them now, and she took them one by one, slowly and deliberately, until mere feet separated her from Garotte. “You're too late. In seconds, those missiles will be on their way. And I assure you, it is for the best. You haven't seen what I've seen. If you knew what lurked on the horizon, you would gladly trade the millions of lives that will be lost in the weeks ahead for the billions that will be saved in the years that follow.”
“Millions that will be lost . . .” her second-in-command whispered.
“I am awaiting status, tactical,” Purcell stated, when the all-ready had failed to come through.
“There . . . there is a problem with the computer. It isn't responding. Disc access and processor utilization are maxed out. Doors are locked down all over the station. I can't move troops. The only thing we've got is communication.”
“Looks like our furry little hacker did the job,” Silo said.
“Damn it, fix it! I want to be firing those things in thirty seconds, you hear me!?”
“You're really going to do it,” Marx realized.
“Quiet!” Purcell demanded.
“You are going to endanger all of those lives!?”
“We will do what is necessary to preserve our future. Now quiet! That is an order!”
He raised his weapon. “I know all too well that unwillingness to adapt is a death sentence, but I will not be one of the executioners. I will not--”
Purcell turned and fired. For a moment, the man remained standing, his face plastered with a look of agony and betrayal, the overpowered weapon having easily left a smoldering wound over his heart. Finally, the man crumbled to the ground.
“Does anyone else feel their loyalty to our cause wavering?” Purcell hissed at her men.
In a swift motion, Garotte disengaged his shield, pulled her arm to the small of her back, and put his pistol to her head.
“Not really relevant anymore, I think,” Garotte said. “How's that coming, Silo?”
“Hard to say, really.”
“Well, hurry, because--”
Purcell hooked her leg behind his ankle and pulled him off balance. He wrenched her wrist as he stumbled, pulling her gun free from her hand. She pivoted, her fingers tearing at his belt and ripping the shield generator free. Her other hand caught his wrist, twisting it painfully, forcing the weapon from his fingers. Garotte pulled free and kicked both pistols away. The flurry of motion left Garotte and Purcell on firm footing, facing each other. Rather than retreating, she drew the knife from her belt and advanced.
“Switch!” Garotte said, backpedaling.
Silo stood and put the muzzle of her rifle to the commander's face.
“Look who brought a knife to a gun f--”
Purcell swiped, the knife emitting a tone as it sliced easily through the barrel of the rifle.
“--udge!” Silo finished.
The commander attempted a second slice, but Silo pulled back, and the two began to battle in earnest. It was a symphony of threatening sounds, with the knife humming like a mosquito through the air, and the remains of the rifle whistling in vicious swings. Silo knew that a single slice from that knife would likely end the battle--and her life along with it. Purcell learned a similar lesson when a wild swing of the rifle struck the wall and left a deeper divot than most of the weapon blasts had. As a result of her few years on Manticore, any blunt object was a deadly weapon in Silo's hands.
Attacks flew faster and closer, each woman dodging the other's blows by narrower and narrower margins. On one side, the smattering of remaining soldiers held their weapons ready, but refused to fire out of fear that they would hurt their commander. One of them tried to move in and lend a hand in the melee, but a screeching stray slice of Purcell's knife cut through several very useful bits of anatomy. Witnessing this event gave the surviving soldiers a healthy respect for the danger the swinging weapons posed. They kept their distance.
On the other side, Garotte worked at the door to the weapons bay.
“This bloody thing is warped. The mechanism is fused,” he growled.
“Quit making excuses,” Silo huffed.
At the commander's belt, her communicator chirped.
“--sense they would put a com panel on this thing. Boss lady, you hear me?” Karter's groggy voice remarked as the battle raged on. “I gotta say, I'm really liking this transporter of yours. And that was a pretty clever idea, putting targeting transmitters in your ships for emergency rescue. In related news, I'm all out of grenades, and you only have one ship left.”
Purcell roared in anger and managed a desperate strike that Silo couldn't dodge. The demo expert raised her rifle-turned-club to block, and the knife sliced neatly through, missing Silo's fingers by millimeters. Now left with a uselessly small remnant of her former weapon, Silo threw the remaining portion aside and grasped the knife hand by the wrist, easily overpowering her with a squeeze that nearly shattered Purcell's wrist, forcing the commander to release the weapon. As it fell, still active, it slipped past Silo's arm, effortlessly opening a long slit in her suit and a shallow gash in her flesh before sinking hilt-deep into the floor. Silo cried out and released the commander, and the women separated, each clutching an injured arm. For a moment, each eyed the other tensely, eyes darting briefly to the weapon as it screeched its high-pitch wail and vibrated in its self-carved slot. An instant before either attempted to grab it, a voice rang out from the other side of the hall.
“Nobody move!”
All eyes turned to the source of the order. There stood Lex among the fallen soldiers at the end of the hall nearest to the heroes, energy pistol in one hand and motionless Ma tucked under one arm. Silo seized the moment to grab Purcell, spin her around, and immobilize her arms.
“Excellent timing, as always, my boy. Hand that over, would you?” Garotte said, quickly turning from the door. He caught the pistol as it was tossed to him. “Right, now--let's think about this logically, shall we? This is a military crew, and you are running this like a military operation. Those CMEAs are clearly weapons of mass destruction, and, in a military operation, things like that need command authorization to fire, thanks to computer failsafes, yes?”
Purcell did not answer.
“Yes?” Garotte asked more insistently, placing the gun to Purcell's face.
She nodded stiffly.
“And am I correct in assuming that, at this point, you are the only one on the space station that has command authorization?”
Another stiff nod.
Karter's voice crackled out of the radio on her belt: “Getting bored now.”
“So, in theory, all I need to do is blow your head off and the crisis is averted--but there is still the tiny matter of making it out of this alive, which is a very appealing outcome for me. Therefore, here is what is going to happen. You fellows are going to stand down. I happen to know you've got a few holding cells in this place. Find them and climb in. I'll be keeping the commander here, for my own safety and hers, until we can reach the missiles, disarm them, and wipe the design from your systems. Then we'll be taking her with us as we exit.”
“Oh, hey. There's another transport target,” Karter's voice observed.
Garotte continued to dictate his orders. Lex paced over to the others, but he couldn't quite shake the feeling that something was wrong.
“This ought to be interesting. Radius set,” Karter said.
Lex's eyes shot open, and he fumbled with his free hand in his pocket. Inside, he found the target Karter had tossed to him. It had managed to activate while it was in his pocket. Juggling the device and the sleeping funk, he tried to get his panicked fingers to twist the top into the “off” position, but he lost his grip, causing it to fall and skitter along the floor.
“Target set,” Karter continued.
“Scatter! Get away from that thing!” Lex yelped.
“Antimatter cartridge loaded . . .”
A moment of utter chaos, something that Lex realized was happening far too frequently these days, followed. In the space of a few heartbeats, Purcell thrust an elbow into Silo's stomach as the hero tried to drag her away. The blow, combined with the sudden need to dodge, was enough to allow the commander to escape. She snatched up her knife and rushed toward her troops while Lex, Silo, and Garotte retreated.
“Engage.”
A flash filled the hall, accompanied by a rush of wind strong enough to hurl all present to the ground. The roar of wind came with a thunderclap and the screech of metal. The first to recover was Lex, who managed to squint through the purple and blue blotches in his vision to see . . . frankly, he wasn't sure. It was a mass of metal and glass. Where it met the walls and floor, both the object and the structure had buckled, twisted, and fused. The edge that faced the heroes was bulged outward, layers of metal, sparking wires, leaking tubes, and twitching components having been clipped off by the transporter into an almost beautiful random design. It completely filled the hallway, with the exception of a few inches from the ceiling, where the spherical shape was rendered irregular by a few flat surfaces of glass.
“What is that?” Silo asked.
“Well, the other target was inside the ship . . . I guess that's a spherical hunk of the ship?” Lex surmised.
Working off of that theory, the glass at the top did appear to be part of a cockpit, though glancing through it indicated that if there was a pilot, most of him was on the other side of the wall, which clearly hadn't been a terribly healthy experience.
“I must not have been paying attention. How did it get here?” Silo asked.
“They have a transporter, and Karter is at the controls,” Lex explained.
“That is the most terrifying thing I've ever heard,” Silo uttered.
“Did that do something interesting?” Karter's voice asked. “I expected an explosion or something. And I'm all out of antimatter for this thing, so I can't do any more.”
The next sound they heard was Purcell smashing her radio in anger.
“We've still got a chance. The door is on our side,” Silo said.
“I'll try to get it open, but it is clearly built to withstand an internal explosion, and the mechanism is fused,” Garotte said, making his way to the door and beginning his efforts anew.
“Go around the other way and stop them,” Purcell ordered from the other side of the blockage.
The troops hurried through the hole she'd cut in the door, the commander close behind.
“Lex, try to find some weapons from the pile of failed security guards there that aren't too badly damaged. We're about to have company,” Silo advised. “I'm glad they didn't decide to do that earlier.”
“They probably needed her knife to cut through all of those locked doors,” Garotte guessed. “Or they are idiots. Equal likelihood, I'd say.”
The pilot tried to rummage through the wreckage and remains without thinking too hard about the fact that they had been alive a few minutes ago. He also refused to put Ma's sleeping body down to do it. They had managed to turn up three guns that had a reasonable chance of working when they heard the pounding of boots.
“Commander! Tactical here,” came a voice over the station's damaged PA system. “We're getting some partial computer control back. I think I can give you voice interface.”
From her cover in an adjoining hallway, Purcell snatched a communicator from one of the soldiers.
“Activate voice interface!” she bellowed.
“Voice interface active,” replied a low-grade computerized voice.
“Launch CMEA! Command voice code six-eight-eight-three.”
“No,” the voice said.
“Damn it! Repeat, Launch Coronal Mass Ejection Activator, now! Command voice code six-eight-eight-three.”
“Your coarse language is not called for, Commander Purcell,” said a very familiar voice.
“Ma!?” exclaimed all three of the heroes, with equal confusion, back at the door.
“My control program has been loaded onto the space station's core system. I am currently decompressing, and attempting to gain control over the subsystems,” Ma explained over their radios.
“So you aren't dead!? Not even this you?” Lex said, indicating the funk.
“No. I was able to break encryption and transfer a duplicate of my full data image prior to critical corruption. But I appreciated your concern. It was very sweet.”
“Yes, yes. A tearful reunion after thirty seconds of separation. Lovely,” Garotte said. “Can you open the door to the weapons bay, or perhaps destroy the missiles remotely?”
“Negative. There is a mechanical fault in the door mechanism, and the CMEA is not coupled to any station system besides the launch apparatus.”
“Can you maybe tell us why we aren't getting shot at by soldiers?” Silo asked, eyes still trained on the unobstructed hallway, weapon raised.
“Most of the surveillance on this deck has been destroyed, but an emergency storage locker in an adjoining corridor has been accessed,” the computer informed.
“What were the contents?” Garotte asked.
“Medical equipment, water, nonperishable food, one space suit, and supplementary oxygen,” she said. “There is now an attempt to access a secondary airlock.”
“She's going to go external. She's going to access it from the outside,” Garotte realized. “The schematics show that there is a massive external payload door on the space-facing side of the bay for loading ordinance.”
“Can't Ma just lock her out?” Lex asked.
“I have not yet completely taken control of all systems, and even if I had, manual overrides exist for both door control and weapon launch. If she reaches the door, she can open it, and if she reaches the launch controls, she can fire the weapons,” Ma stated.
“I think we're going to have to consider finding a way to blow the whole station,” Silo said gravely.
“That may not be possible in the time available. I do not have deep enough control to produce a catastrophic failure, and am unlikely to gain that level of control prior to the launch of the weapons.”
“All we need to do is find a way to set off the weapons inside the weapons bay.”
“With the exception of the CME Activators themselves, which are non-explosive, there are no weapons in the weapons bay.”
“What?” Garotte said, expression blank.
“Station records indicate that the Neo-Luddites are extremely under-equipped, and most of their existing large-scale weaponry was disassembled for the parts to create the CME Activators and subsequent fabricated equipment.”
“Well, that would have been nice to know five minutes ago. Everybody, clear out. This door is about to get what's coming to it,” Silo said, unstrapping her grenade belt and beginning to make some choice selections.
“This way, my boy,” Garotte said, grasping Lex and pulling him down the hallway. “Here's what you need to do while we're working at this. Find a spare suit so that we can get Silo back into the ship for the getaway, or get Ma to pressurize the launch bay--”
“Please remember that you are now able to address me directly,” Ma stated.
“--then go and wrangle Karter, and get him to The Declaration. And ditch the rodent,” Garotte continued. “I'll stay here and see to it that nothing happens to our darling Miss Silo.”
“Your referral to my previous incarnation as a rodent is once again inappropriate in terms of both biology and etiquette,” Ma objected.
“What happens if I run into soldiers?” Lex asked.
Garotte tapped the gun in his hand. “Shoot them. Are we clear?”
“Crystal,” Lex replied.
“Splendid. Off with you, then,” he said, slapping the pilot on the back to send him on his way.
As Lex rushed off, Ma spoke through his radio. “I have begun rapid-pressurizing the docking bay. Please focus your attentions preferentially on Karter. I will link your radio to the com panel in the storage bay now.”
After a tone, Lex yelled, “Karter!”
“You aren't dead?” Karter's voice responded, with a vaguely insulting level of surprise.
“No, I'm not. Your concern is touching. Are you okay up there?”
“Yeah. Except for the way the room is spinning. I don't know if it is the blood loss or the meds, but I am feelin' it right now.”
“Well, we've got a ship in the hangar . . .”
“Who's we?”
“Me, Silo, Garotte, and Ma.”
“Am I supposed to know who those people are?”
“You worked with them!”
“Doesn't sound like anyone I'd associate with,” Karter slurred.
“Ma, help me out here,” Lex groaned.
“Gladly, Lex. Mr. Alexander is referring to Sgt. Jessica Winters, the heavy weapons expert, and the variously-named British agent, each of whom had routinely sought your help until their incarceration.”
“Ma? What are you doing here?”
“I am performing my primary function: keeping and/or getting you out of trouble.”
“Well, you screwed up the first part.”
“Perhaps if you were a more effective programmer, this wouldn't have happened.”
“Can we do this later?” Lex asked. “I want very badly to get out of here.”
“Yeah. Me, too. The food's terrible,” Karter groaned.
#
Silo and Garotte retreated to a safe distance--and, for good measure, ducked inside a separate room.
“That's a hell of a door. It took every grenade I had. Variables at cross beams, high-yield at key supports. The line between 'get the door open' and 'crack the hull' is a pretty narrow one. What I did should be enough to knock it from its hinges. Fuse should blow in five,” Silo said, and then covered her ears.
The explosion came on schedule, and was the short, sharp clap of a controlled explosion combined with the odd, rippling echo one gets from loud sounds in hallways. When the creaking of metal and the rattle of equipment settled down, and there was no sudden rush of escaping gas that would have indicated a hull breach, the pair ventured outside. Every light even remotely nearby was shattered, leaving them in complete darkness. Garotte tapped on his helmet-mounted lights and observed the carnage. Most of the hallway was a mess of twisted, blackened metal, and the whole wall was bowed inward . . . but the door was still in place.
“E-gad they built these stations sturdy back then,” Garotte mused.
Silo paced up to the door, looked it over, and gave it a powerful thrust-kick. The weakened metal let out a final screech and the door rattled to the ground like an overturned turtle.
“I was close. I guess I'm just a bit rusty,” she said, ducking inside, Garotte hot on her heels.
The interior of the weapons bay was just as bare as Ma had suggested it would be. , it was a machinery-strewn room. A bit taller than one deck and barely three meters deep, it was nearly as long as their hallway battleground. One could see where a thicket of mechanical limbs, conveyors, and equipment had once been attached with the purpose of feeding ammunition to the primary weapons systems. Now the cupboard was bare, with the ammo racks and cases open and empty, and machinery scavenged to build Karter's toys. Along the floor were three troughs, the only portions of the bay that were fully stocked and intact, each displaying two nondescript missiles lying end to end. They were the size and shape of metallic telephone poles, with panel seams and emitter heads scattered sparsely across the surface and a black-tiled tip serving as the only details, giving it the appearance of a burnt wooden match as envisioned by a jeweler.
Without wasting time on his usual banter, Garotte drew his weapon and fired a burst of shots. Rather than striking the CMEA, they splashed against a field of some sort, vanishing without even scorch marks. Several additional shots to the others brought the same effect--that was to say, no effect at all.
“That's disappointing,” he said steadily, keying the radio. “Lex, have you found Karter yet?”
“Still getting there, but we've got a line open to him,” Lex replied.
“Karter, how do we destroy these missiles you made?”
“With great difficulty. They're designed to plunge as far as possible into a star, remember?”
“There's got to be a way.”
“Well, if you fracture a few of the heat tiles in the front, they'll burn up before they can do their thing. Those are ceramic, pretty brittle. Low-velocity blunt force should get through the energy shielding, and enough of it would do the trick . . .”
Silo rushed to the tip of one of the missiles, raised the butt of her borrowed rifle, and bashed at the tip, causing one of the tiles to chip.
“I wouldn't recommend it, though. It has automated defenses,” he continued.
One of the panels near the center of the missile popped aside and revealed a small energy cannon, which fired three random shots that Silo narrowly managed to dodge before it retracted again.
“Why would you put something like that on there!?” she cried.
“So it would do that to people who try to do what you did. I design things to get jobs done, even if people try to stop them. That's the way--” Karter began.
“Someone is accessing the exterior release,” Ma announced.
“We're out of time,” Garotte said.
Silo ran to the damaged CMEA and delivered another blow, rolling aside and attempting to strike another while the first one fired. The mechanisms controlling the door began to grind.
“I cannot stop the door. It will open in less than a minute,” Ma alerted.
“Silo, now! Between us and the crazy woman with the knife, half of the doors are blown open. Half of this station is about to be a hard vacuum and you don't have a helmet!”
“Millions of lives, Garotte! This is the mission!” Silo proclaimed.
“You can't break them all, we need another way!”
“I don't care, I have to try!”
“You--”
Whatever sentiment he'd had in mind was cut short by the apocalyptic wail of air escaping. The spaceward wall split like a zipper, inching slowly open. Garotte flipped down and sealed the visor of his suit. Silo dropped to the ground and grasped the edge of the missile-trough and dragged herself forward. The flow of air was steadily increasing in intensity. Garotte looked desperately about until he caught sight of a case installed on the wall, its door flapping in the growing gale. He barely managed to reach it before the rushing wind pulled his feet from the ground. He hooked the end of the strap for his own rifle onto a brace inside and unhooked the other end, looping it through a belt on the space suit before finally releasing his grip on the case. The escaping atmosphere ripped him to the end of the strap, where he dangled and whipped, a foot or so from the point where Silo ran out of handholds. He extended his hand to her, and she shakily extended hers.
Loose bolts and fragments of metal were launching through the bay, gouging into the floor and ceiling. A fragment of shrapnel slashed across one arm of his suit, breaking the seal. One or two of the stray soldiers on the deck made a brief appearance in the bay before tumbling out the door. The rush of wind all but blinded Silo, but finally her hand met his.
Instantly, her grip nearly crushed his fingers. Hand over hand, she hauled herself down his arm, down his body, along the strap, and, finally, into the case. Shielded at least partially from the wind, but already feeling the effects of the drop in pressure, she managed to reel Garotte in, and the two of them wrestled the door shut. In the pitch-black and cramped confines, Garotte found the control pad for his suit and punched in a command that opened a vent and pressurized the tiny space. It wasn't until the wind outside gave way mostly to airless vacuum that they became aware of the voice insistently repeating a message.
“--is open and atmosphere loss is critical. Silo and Garotte, what is your status? The door is open and atmosphere loss is critical. Silo and Garotte--” Ma's voice droned.
“We're here! We're okay,” Silo said, gratefully gasping deep breaths of the oxygen.
“There was an equipment case for pressure-sensitive tools and materials. We managed to get inside, but until you can get this weapons bay pressurized again, we're stuck here, because Silo doesn't have an intact suit, and neither do I,” Garotte explained. “There are at least four undamaged missiles.”
“Karter, Lex, please report status,” Ma said.
“I got to Karter. It was a little tricky getting into the transporter room, now that half the floor is missing, but I got him and the suit out. Now me, M--uh . . . Squee and Karter are in the next corridor over. There is an awful lot of creaking and groaning, but I think we're airtight, at least for now,” Lex replied over the radio. “What do we do now?”
“Processing . . . I have taken full control of long-range communication and external sensors. I am attempting to prepare a contingency. In the meantime, is your space suit intact?” Ma asked.
“Yes.”
“Has Karter been outfitted with a suit?”
“Not yet; he's being uncooperative.”
“Hey, listen. I'm already losing my buzz, and I'm not in a friendly mood thanks to this hole in my back, which everybody seems to be ignoring,” remarked Karter.
“Lex, you will have to find a way to reach the weapons bay and prevent the CMEAs from firing. Karter, you need to find a way to detonate the station if Lex fails,” Ma dictated.
“That would kill me, Ma,” Karter said, as if to a child. “We don't do that, remember?”
“It would kill all of us, but it would save a considerable number of lives. It is an undesirable result, but preferable to the alternative.”
“I seriously messed up some of your algorithms, Ma,” he muttered. “When we get home--”
“The weapons bay doors have finished opening. There is someone accessing the manual launch controls. Patching in to communications.”
#
In the weapons bay, Purcell was crouched at a small panel on the floor. The station's gravity had pulled her down upon her entry, and it was the work of a few moments to find the manual launch control. Three commands were all it took to drop all six missiles into launch tubes. Entering the command authorization for the actual launch was proving to be more time-consuming though, particularly with the bulky gloves of the emergency pressure suit she'd been forced to use. Unlike its voice counterpart, the code was easily as cumbersome as the suit, an eighty-digit mess that a less disciplined commander wouldn't have taken the time to memorize.
“Discontinue your current activities or I will be forced to take preventative measures,” Ma instructed through the emergency suit's radio.
“You're the one who refused to launch the missiles!” Purcell hissed. “Who are you?”
“Altruistic Artificial Intelligence Control System, Version 1.27, revision 2331.04.01, subset 1.2, Designation 'Ma,'” she replied.
“An artificial intelligence? Then there is nothing you can do to stop me. You are not capable of harming a human,” the commander said, going back to work.
“Incorrect. I am an Altruistic AI. There is no programmatic safeguard prohibiting that or any other action. So don't tempt me.”
“There's no way you can attack me in here. There is no computer control anymore.”
“One of my associates is en route to your location, and an additional alternative is being deployed.”
“Uh . . .” Lex's voice interjected over the radio. “I might be a bit held up. There are some soldiers here still, and they've got me and Karter cornered.”
A radio crackle signaled some actions on Ma's part. When she spoke again, it was only to her allies. “I have gained control of primary and secondary navigational control. The damage to the station is extreme, but I may be able to cause a distraction. Please restrain yourselves.”
“Karter, hold on. Okay, done,” said Lex, grabbing tightly to the nearest handrail in the side chamber he'd taken refuge in.
“This should be good,” Karter remarked.
“Haven't got much of a choice. There's not a tremendous amount of elbow room in here,” Garotte replied.
“I'll say,” Silo agreed.
“Stand by,” Ma said. “Artificial gravity deactivated. Inertial inhibitor deactivated. Maneuvering thrusters active. Setting to two hundred percent capacity, burst mode.”
As gravity disengaged, the various pieces of debris and the remaining inhabitants of the station slowly drifted from the ground.
“Thrusters prepared. Firing.”
Instantly, the whole of the station rocked to one side. Those who were unrestrained were sent careening into the walls. In the weapons bay, Purcell was yanked away from the control panel and scrambled to activate her weak, zero-G maneuvering jets again to try to reach it.
“Firing . . . firing . . . firing . . .” Ma dictated.
With each statement, the station took another shift. The soldiers and Purcell were rattled about, bouncing forcefully off of the walls until the shifting finally stopped.
“Thruster heat level critical, entering cool-down phase,” Ma explained.
“Okay, okay!” Lex said shakily. “The soldiers are pretty discombobulated. I'm going to try to get by.”
“Acknowledged. Thrusters offline. Artificial gravity active.”
As gravity suddenly reasserted, the unprepared and bewildered crashed to the ground.
“Karter, stay safe and take care of Squee,” Lex said, hanging the funk around its creator's neck.
“Uh-huh,” Karter said, glancing down at the creature. “Hey, have you been tampering with this thing? That wire is not stock.”
Ignoring the inventor, Lex burst from his cover and charged down the hall.
#
In the weapons bay, Commander Purcell recovered from the rock tumbler of a journey she had just taken. She dragged herself along the floor to the panel and resumed her code entry.
“What is your status, Lex?” Ma asked.
“Running! How long have I got?”
“Commander Purcell has entered sixty-eight out of eighty necessary digits.”
“I don't know if I can--”
“Seventy-one.”
“I'm at least three decks away, I don't--”
“Seventy-eight. The code is entered. Commander Purcell, this is the last warning you will receive. Do not activate the CME Activators.”
“You cannot stand in the way of progress. The ashes of today will fertilize the fields of tomorrow, and I shall be the one to light the flames!”
Her gloved hand came down on the execute command. The grind of machinery rang out, and with six distinct streaks of engine flare, the CMEAs fired.
“You should not have done that,” Ma stated.
“In a century, when mankind has advanced beyond the timid, cowardly apes we are today, I will be hailed as a savior,” she proclaimed.
“Stand by . . .” Ma stated.
“It is over. You've lost,” Purcell announced defiantly. “Stand by for what?”
“The contingency plan,” Ma stated.
At a whisper of motion in the corner of her eye, Purcell turned to the open loading door of the weapons bay. Rapidly approaching was a sleek, black ship. Retro-rockets flashed and the ship came to a stop outside the door. A turret repositioned, and a dim light traced a flickering line from the ship to the commander. Purcell felt it as a crushing, immobilizing force.
“What . . . what is that?” Purcell struggled.
“That is Son of Betsy, the ship belonging to one of the individuals currently infiltrating this station. I am controlling it remotely, and it is holding you in its tractor beam,” Ma explained. “Some of your men have locked down the bay containing The Declaration of War, but Son of Betsy is fully under my control.”
“Force her to deactivate the missiles! Send a kill code! Call them back!” Silo urged over the radio.
“Uh, yeah, that won't work,” Karter said. “They don't have transceivers. There's no kill switch.”
“Why not!?” Silo asked.
“Because no one put a kill switch in the design specification,” Karter said simply.
“I am opening a communication connection to all decks of the station. Tell your soldiers to stand down,” Ma instructed.
Purcell struggled to take a deep breath as the channel opened. “Attention, men . . . fight to your last breath!”
“I urge you to reconsider. You will not receive any more opportunities to do so,” Ma stated. Her time as an organic creature must have produced some lingering effects on her voice module, because she managed a tone of smoldering anger far more effectively than a few chopped-up voice response systems should have been able to manage.
“I am dedicated to my cause. As long as I draw breath, I will do everything I can to tear down the technologies that are holding us back. I will never stop. I wouldn't be afraid of you even if you could hurt me, but you are a machine. There's nothing you can do.”
“Once again, I must inform you that you are incorrect. Your belief that I am incapable of harming a human is based upon the three laws of robotics, which were not a part of my design. I do not have laws governing my actions--only principles, which are far more flexible. You have threatened the lives of my friends and my creator. You have set into motion a sequence of events which, if they unfold as projected, may irreparably damage the stability of human society for generations. You have stated the intention to continue this behavior if given further opportunities. You have made me very angry. I find violence of any kind extremely distasteful, but occasionally justifiable after extreme deliberation.”
“Your hollow threats don't frighten--”
“Deliberation complete,” Ma stated dispassionately.
With a pivot and turn, S.O.B. whipped its captured prey to the side, hurling Purcell out the loading doors and slinging her into the blackness of space. Before she could even manage to scream, she was outside of the limited transmission range of her suit's radio. A moment later, Lex came skidding into the damaged doorway, pistol raised.
“Hold it right . . . uh . . . Ma? Where'd the bad guy go?” he asked.
“Away,” the AI stated. “Please disengage the manual override on the loading doors so that I can attempt to pressurize the bay and release Garotte and Silo. You need to leave this star system as soon as possible. I have alerted local authorities of the impending catastrophe, and they are quite likely to send patrol ships here.”
“You mean . . .”
“All six CME Activators have been deployed. We have lost.”