Gamma Nine (Book One) (19 page)

The overhead
swing did not stop, it fell on another enemy, carving it clean
through. Pyoter twisted his wrists to change the downward angle of
the blade just as it tore free of the mutated body. It swooped down
to the right; Pyoter removed his left hand from the grip as he
allowed its speed to carry it past his body on the right, cutting
the legs off from a monster that had dared to step closer. He
rocked back on his right leg, bringing the blade back in its arc to
his right, straightening his arm while he turned it, shifting the
blade’s weight to allow the swing to complete above the owner’s
head. Pyoter brought the blade up and gripped it with both hands
again, his arms straining as he brought it down at a right to left
angle on a beast in front of him, ripping it apart from shoulder to
hip as he planted his left leg firmly on the deck. Blood spurted
everywhere as arteries exploded, the giant Titan was covered in the
infected fluid, but luckily his suit was sealed and he was safe
from such worries.

He pivoted on
his left foot, shifting his weight to it. The blade followed the
Titan’s guidance and separated infected heads from infected bodies.
Pyoter spun on his weighted leg, cutting surrounding enemies into
more manageable parts. He was about to swing again when the boom of
an explosion buffeted him from behind, the beasts around him lost
their footing, some going down as the shockwave hit them, the
bigger bastards remained standing - although Pyoter had bisected
most of them already.

Rivers and his
little robot had succeeded; the door had closed almost completely,
a gap barely wide enough for a child to pass through was all that
remained open. Smoke poured from the crack, Xander’s grenades had
destroyed the corridor outside of the bridge, probably compromising
the Fateful Moment’s hull integrity as well.

“Whoops!”
Xander said as he coughed from excitement. “I think that was the
big boomer.”

“Idiot, you
could have killed us with your boomers!” Nathan retorted. He was
already climbing over the scattered dead bodies of the infected,
heading for the fight Pyoter was busy with.

“But I didn’t.
And now they can’t get through. I keep telling you, explosives can
solve any problem we come across.”

“Keep
fighting!” Locke yelled at his explosives expert. “Help Pyoter and
the Lancers you fool.”

Rivers took
position at bridge’s door, inspecting the damage beyond. He stayed
a little longer to make sure that nothing could get through the
destroyed corridor and attack them from behind.

Christian had
not bothered to speak after the explosion; instead he had used his
shield to plough into the side ranks of the beasts still
surrounding his squad mate. He gave the giant the space he needed
and fought on the outskirts of the crowd of monsters. Hacking body
parts from bodies and bludgeoning heads with his shield.

Locke, Xander
and Nathan did the same and mere minutes after the explosion the
ranks of the enemies that tried to surprise the Wolves were thinned
to only a handful. Blood ran in streams through the grating of the
deck below the bridge, pooling in the shadows below.

“Very
impressive humans! Very entertaining!” the AIE said with glee, its
voice sounding like a child’s again. “I can’t wait to see
more!”

Pyoter killed
the last of the Beast on the bridge, hacking it into pieces in
front of the AIE’s perch, almost intentionally. As luck would have
it the rag-tag squad had suffered no casualties, but the fight had
taken its toll on everyone. The Titans were not tired, but weary
about whatever was next, the Lancers were still holding their
nerve, but they had almost spent all of their ammo in the
fight.

They were
definitely not prepared for whatever came next.

Jessica, her
sister and clumsy Sam had made it to the habitation block without
being seen. Sam had hacked the military frequencies in Santor,
listening to the pocket radio he carried with him whenever they had
paused to catch their breath. The picture it painted was beyond
grim.

All of the
specimens inside Beta Facility had escaped and were unaccounted
for. The defence forces had been too late to contain the beasts
within. Which meant the worst case scenario was about to play out
on New Horizon. Only one of those creatures could cause havoc on a
densely populated world, but now there were more than fifty of
those things roaming free in Santor.

Jessica
quickened her pace through the dimly lit corridors of the
habitation block they were navigating through, lost in the memories
of the events of the last few days. She had been here as a child
with her father, visiting an old friend of his. It was then that
she had been told about the hidden bunker, her father making her
promise to keep it secret, to only go there should there be no
other options.

There were no
other options left to the trio, all flights had been grounded,
P-SEP protocols being enforced on the entire planet, containing
whatever was happening to the surface. Any ship trying to leave was
shot down by the military flyers patrolling the skies over every
city or colony across New Horizon. The trio had seen many civilian
ships shot from the sky while they headed for the hidden bunker,
bleeding smoke and flame as they plummeted to their respective
dooms.

One ship would
forever be etched into their memories, its death shocking all three
of them into silence, silence that continued for the rest of the
run to the habitation block they intended to enter.

A civilian
shuttle, large enough for at least a thousand people in its cargo
hold, was sitting on a docking pad with its cargo doors open. The
crew of the ship had been loading women and children into its
belly, hoping to act as a life boat to the people they were trying
to save. Jessica, Tristan and Sam had seen it being loaded on their
way to their own safety, and they had watched from an embankment on
the edge of the docking stations, hidden between old discarded
cargo containers.

They had
watched as it was taking off when two military flyers appeared from
the sky above and dove on the make-shift life boat. It was called
the Black Saint, and it died just above the docking station’s pad
in a brilliant flash of light. Pilots on-board the Crescent
fighters were only doing their duty, making sure that it would
never fly again, aiming for the engines to disable the ship before
it could make a break for orbit. The pilots knew exactly what was
on-board the ship they were firing on. But the pilots were too good
or complete novices, and their actions would surely haunt them
forever. The blood of the dead was on their hands forever.

Their lance
fire had punctured the Black Saint’s fuel tanks, causing a
catastrophic rupture to engulf the entire ship. The explosion had
blown the Black Saint into millions of pieces, scattering the
bodies of women and children all across the docking station. The
smell of the burning fuel and worst of all the burning corpses of
mere children was unbearable. Jessica had seen the scene penetrate
her sister’s psyche, and she had seen the tears form in her eyes as
the trio stood in horrified silence, unable to accept what had just
happened. Even Sam could not control himself; he had dropped to his
knees praying for the souls of the dead as the sisters turned away
from the soul-crushing scene.

But there was
no time to think on what happened anymore. Jessica rounded a corner
and instantly recognized the hallway they were in. They had made
it, only a few more steps and they would be in front of the
apartment above the hidden bunker.

Now they only
had to barter their way in, the owner was a notorious rogue, and he
only understood the language of the coins in his pockets.

Only problem
was, none of the trio had any coins to barter with, and that was
what worried Jessica the most.

She only had
her charm, and it was probably not going to be enough. But she was
going to try anyways.

“
Destruction, it is
the only language the universe understands. It spills out of every
crack, saturating every living thing in the cosmos. Some wield it
for good, others for evil, each on opposite sides of the spectrum
of death, but there are those that linger in the middle, and those
are the ones you truly need to be afraid of.”
-Captain Harlow, Titan Hero, KIA

“Marvellous!”
the AIE said with glee, giggling again as it spoke. “Such drama,
such magnificent murder, please don’t stop now, there is so much
more to come!”

Locke ignored
the insane machine, turning to were Rivers was standing with Roger.
“We need an escape route, make it quick.”

Rivers nodded,
taking a knee as he worked on his wrist-mounted display.

“Oh dear, have
I offended you my play things? Please don’t take it personally; I
am only following my master’s orders.”

Those words
made everyone on the blood filled bridge focus on the machine.
Nathan was the one to reply to the AIE first. “What orders? What is
the endgame here?”

“Your deaths of
course, I was ordered to destroy you. I was told what a monumental
threat you are to my master, so he told me to end all of you. I
have already destroyed millions of your race at my master’s
commands, but you are the first ones to fight back, something that
has impressed and entertained me immensely. You cannot imagine how
boring it was to be locked away in my master’s ship for so long,
without anything to do except think, think about everything.” It
giggled again, its voice now more childlike again, changing with
almost every word as it used the voices of the people it had
crossed paths with or murdered.

“What threat
could we possibly be to anyone? We protect! We fight for
humankind!” Nathan said to the AIE, his voice rose as he uttered
the last words.

“My master’s
plan is far greater than you think. I believe the Titans are in his
way.”

“How could we
be in his way?”

“He did not
share his entire plan with me. I am after all only his
slave...subordinate.” The AIE made a strange noise when it used the
word slave, its internals clicking as if something inside it had
made it correct itself.

Everyone on the
bridge noticed the machine’s slip, but they said nothing. Locke was
curious about it, stepping closer to join in the conversation while
the Wolves and the Lancers waited for Rivers to find them an escape
route from the bridge.

“You are his
slave?” Locke added, trying to push the machine to say more.

“I am in a
manner of speaking; my master dislikes me using that word. He found
a way to control me, tricked me into serving him. I cannot say
more, my parameters will not allow me to.” It sounded distressed,
as if it did not understand why it could not say more, it was clear
that it wanted to.

“Your master
put a leash on you, and he is using you. Can’t you see that?” Locke
asked the machine, careful not to raise his voice at the insane
thing of metal and circuits.

“I can, but I
cannot say nor do anything about it. My master made sure of
that.”

“Who is your
master?” Nathan asked from beside Locke.

“I cannot say,”
it replied. “Please stop asking me, this line of conversation is
paining me. You are starting to anger me, ruining my elaborate
game.”

“Don’t make it
angry Nathan,” Locke said over the squad channel. “Our survival
depends on this thing’s mood.”

The AIE knew
the two Titans were talking to each other, but it could never break
into the analogue channels they were using, and that frustrated it
more than anything. It wanted to hear and see everything,
experience everything and then play games with whatever it found to
be worthy. Now these armoured humans were starting to spoil its new
game, and that is something it could not allow to happen any
further. It was all it had, without the games it and its master
played it would have gone insane a long time ago.

It was ironic
that it thought that way, and was completely unaware of the fact
that it was already insane.

“ENOUGH!” the
machine screamed, lights on its metal body flashed bright as its
anger and its frustration shown through. “No more talking! You will
die, my master demanded it!”

The deck
underneath the squad’s boots vibrated and lurched, the Lancers
almost lost their footing, gripping onto the bridge consoles around
them. The Titans stood firm and unmoving.

The psychotic
machine had engaged the main engines of the Fateful Moment, and
they were definitely not heading for anything good.

Rivers needed
to hurry up, everyone knew it, Locke knew it most of all. Whatever
the AIE had planned next, it was going to be very unpleasant for
everyone on-board the death trap called the Fateful Moment.

There was still
no contact with anyone on-board the Fateful Moment. For more than
an hour the radio operators on the bridge of the Hyperion had
worked franticly to contact the detachment sent on-board the silent
vessel. Nothing was getting through on any of the digital channels,
and the Hyperion was too far away to establish contact via the
emergency analogue channels.

Gray had
relinquished control of his ship to his helm officer, and the
officer was doing a good job at minimizing the damage from
asteroids as they patrolled around the Fateful Moment.

The cargo
vessel was tasked to drift silently in the shadow of a moon-sized
asteroid, its orbit synced with that of the giant space rock. A
vessel that had been deliberately placed in their path, whoever had
placed it there made sure they would find it, forcing them into the
trap.

Gray was aware
of the dangers, not only from the asteroids everywhere, but from
whatever was on-board the Fateful Moment. He had tried to work out
who or why would have done such a thing, his mind was still reeling
from Remy’s report about Nox’s fate, and how the sudden asteroid
field had appeared out of nowhere.