Gods Dogs, Book 3

The sinews of war are infinite money.

Marcus Tullius Cicero

The takeover of the main computer was accomplished through guile, stealth, and an old school denial of service.

“What’s the plan?” Jian asked River as the two of them prepped for their part in the next phase of the operation.

River answered, “I left a nano-string in the collar I examined. I asked Satya to connect with it and load our infiltration package. It should be loaded in another hour or so.”

“Then what?”

“Then the collar will report itself as malfunctioning,” River smirked.

“I see. When they do a diagnostic check, the package uploads.”

River nodded her head. “Then it’s a denial of service until the main computer reboots. The classified package unfolds, but we need to be there to plug the NSAI into the trap of a parallel universe that looks exactly like this one.”

Jian tilted her head. “It will think it’s still in this universe, running the station. How does that work?”

“Satya will keep it entertained with normal operations.”

“While we bring in the marines.” Jian grinned.

“Yep. They’re prepped and ready to go. How do you feel about your first live combat?”

“They’re pirates, River. The worse kind of bad guy.”

“Can’t argue with that.”

Moss stuck his head into the room the two women shared in the warehouse space they were using as a base. “You two ready?”

“Yes,” was the reply, and they slapped their rifles to the magnetic locks on the back of their light armor.

River and Jian made for the control room. It was after midnight station time, and they easily avoided what few people were working. Soon they were in the corridor outside the hub awaiting their cue to enter the hub.

Once they were on their way, Quinn asked Moss and Pax, “How would you rate Jian so far?”

“No complaints,” Moss said with a shrug. “She hasn’t seen the elephant yet.”

Quinn nodded and looked to Pax. He said, “Assuming she holds up under fire, I’ll recommend her for empath training.”

“I wondered about that,” Quinn said. “When we were playing OpFor with the militia, she was right where she needed to be most of the time.”

“Let’s hope that pattern holds when we kick this hornet’s nest over,” Moss said with a snicker.

Then they deployed to the areas where there were guard stations. Should alarms sound, they would be in position to delay the enemy response. If there were no alarms, they were also in position to hurry to disable the self-destruct system, and hopefully to interdict the armory if Satya could find its location once they had control of the station.

Becky told River, [The collar is reporting a malfunction.]

The man with the malfunctioning collar reported to a guard station. The dozing guard roughly changed out the collar and connected the bad one to the diagnostic port. The package began loading, sequestering itself in a file entitled ‘activity log,’ which the NSAI ignored.

The non-sentient station A.I., when it brought its attention to the malfunctioning collar, began a series of inquiries. The response was a flurry of answers about the schematics of the station, the duties of the workers, the arrival and departure of the freighters. It was a flood of data that soon overwhelmed the A.I.’s ability to process. As a result, the A.I. followed protocol and initiated a reboot.

Becky told them, [Reboot initiated. You have forty-five seconds.]

It was go time. River and Jian jumped onto the anti-spinward walkway that allowed entrance to the hub. When the aperture swung into view, they bounded through – Jian to the left, River to the right. They stunned the two techs and one guard that drew the early morning shift.

River hurriedly unplugged the main computer and hooked it to the box she brought with her and hooked the box into the mainframe. When the computer finished its reboot, the resident NSAI would enter a separate system where everything would appear normal.

Jian was attending to the other two systems, putting them into a routine maintenance cycle. When they finished that, River should have the command codes to take them over as well.

River was now searching for the admin controls for those systems. Once she located them, she slaved them to the main system that was now under her control.

With these tasks accomplished, she contacted Satya using the more powerful station comm system. Satya was both the ship and the designation of the ship’s computer. It was a Class 2 sentient A.I., which was much more powerful than the ship needed. In a situation like this, though, it was greatly appreciated.

“Satya, it’s all yours,” River said with a grin.

“Very good, Coyote River. I have found the self-destruct and I’m sending the schematics for it to Quinn. And I estimate two hours to copy the files. If I find any anomalies, I’ll let you know.”

“What about an armory?”

“I don’t see one listed.”

“Okay. Thanks, Satya.”

Jian finished dragging the stunned pirates to a steel support and cuffed them to it. Then she asked, “Now what?”

“We lock this place down and meet the boys in the corridor.”

Their teammates were hurrying to disable the self-destruct, which was on the fusion power core on the machinery level of the torus.

There were a few workers they stunned and hid from view, but the task was straightforward and quickly accomplished.

As they finished and headed out, Quinn said, “Still no location on the armory.”

“They must have it in their rooms,” Pax surmised.

“If so, the leadership must trust these guys more than I would,” Moss replied.

Quinn offered, “Well, if they know about the self-destruct, they would fight to make sure it didn’t happen.”

“Yeah,” Moss allowed. “Maybe. But they’re pirates.”

Satya broke in, “Quinn, the marine shuttles are inbound. ETA is two hours.”

“Understood.”

Each of them headed off to meet the marines at one of the three entry points they designated. Once the marines were aboard, they received the schematics of the station and began their deployment.

As planned, the main force would push to get between the workers and the guards. The flankers would clear the levels of the torus, take control of the machinery level, and pitch in where the fighting was heaviest.

Satya, who was now in charge of the workers’ collars, as well as everything else on the station, kept the workers asleep, or put to sleep the few on duty.

Quinn, Moss, and Pax left the marines to their business and hurried to the hub to reinforce Jian and River.

The first half hour went well enough. The marines swept the corridors and rooms of the outer level with little resistance. The next level up was the same. At the housing level, resistance began, but the marines were now between the workers and the guards.

“Shit,” Gunny Murphy spat as he dropped to avoid laser fire. “I think they have independent comms, LT.”

“I think you’re right,” Lieutenant Fowler, who was next to him, said as he returned fire. Then he called out, “Martinez, start jamming their comms.”

“Aye, sir,” came the reply from behind them.

The LT went on, “Heavies, to the front. We need control of the next spoke.”

The exo-skeletons of two heavy weapons specialists clanged forward and sprayed blaster bursts and rail gun fire into the defending guards. Then they slow-walked forward with the marines in light armor following.

The other platoons, which were flanking the main assault, were now tasked with denying the guards access to the spokes. That kept all the guards in one area, and they couldn’t jump up a level to come at the marines from behind.

“Martinez,” the LT turned to the trailing troops as they reached the next spoke.

“Sir,” the specialist said as he jogged up.

“Do you have their comm frequency?”

“Yes, sir,” he said and sent it to the lieutenant.

The LT began broadcasting to the guards, “I am Lieutenant Fowler of the League marines. This pirate operation is shut down. We own this station. We have disabled the self-destruct mechanism. Surrender now.”

There was a lull in the fighting, but it didn’t last.

Anti-personnel missiles shot down the corridor, broke into a dozen pieces each, and detonated. Shrapnel flew as a wave toward the marines, and their shields struggled to repel the wave of hot metal.

The strongest shields were aboard the exo-skeletons, but they were flaring as well.

“Down to 35%,” one of the heavies reported as he raked the fortified position that came into view around the curve of the station walls.

“Use missiles,” the LT told them.

The back frame of the suit pivoted so that ten small missiles attached to a rack pointed forward.

“Firing,” the heavies alerted those behind them, who dropped to a knee.

Two missiles from each heavy slammed into the barricade and blew it into a jagged mess. The heavies followed up with rail guns and continued to advance.

Once the fighting began in earnest, whoever was in charge sent troops to the hub. Satya, though, disabled the lifts. The only way for the troops to get to the hub was to climb.

Each of the Coyotes took a spoke and fired on whatever moved. River brought her sniper rifle, and calmly dispatched the enemy all the way to the outer rim. Jian used the standard over-under, coil-gun or laser, and was accurate up to halfway up the spoke she guarded.

Quinn told them on tac-net, “They have missiles.”

“If they depressurize this thing,” Moss began but didn’t finish.

They all knew the pressure doors would engage, cutting that spoke off. It would be possible for the enemy to get outside and come back in wherever they chose.

Quinn sent, “Satya, let the assault shuttles know they may need to strafe the enemy if they get outside.”

“It’s already in their mission brief, Quinn, but I will remind them.”

Moss chuckled. “I forgot. We have Gunny Murphy with us.”

The battle raged, but it was now slow going for the marines. The strategy to isolate the enemy into one-third of the station worked, but the resulting concentrated fire they mounted drained shields. The marines were now in a slugfest that seesawed across levels 3, 4, and 5.

“Quinn,” Murphy called out on tac-net, “we’ve got another spoke. See what you can do to break this log jam.”

“Okay, gunny.”

All but two spokes were now in marine control, which freed up three Coyotes.

“Pax,” Quinn directed, “go up the one Moss is covering and wreak some havoc behind their lines. Jian, you’re with me.”

The three triggered the stealth feature in the suits and repelled down the spokes to where the enemy was concentrated. Past the machinery level, which the marines held, to the housing level. When they reached the wide corridor, Jian turned right, which was toward the marines, and Quinn went left, which was toward Pax with marines in-between.

Jian fired at the ones guarding her side of the corridor, then slung her rifle and pulled her sword. It was in the style of a willow leaf saber, but shorter in length and sporting a thinner mono-blade – the cutting edge was one molecule wide and would cut through virtually anything.

She began carving her way through the enemy, whirling and leaping over them, pausing only to shove a body into someone trying to shoot her flickering image.

She made it fifty yards down the corridor before a smart NCO yelled out, “Everyone hit the deck! Down, now!”

Jian grabbed the guy she just ran through and fell to her back. With her free hand, she pulled a button grenade and tossed it forward. It exploded just as concentrated laser fire filled the corridor at waist height.

She tossed two more grenades, one to each side, and rolled forward to the carnage her first grenade produced. Sheathing her sword, she pulled her rifle around and began firing at the troops standing or kneeing sixty yards distant.

Her A.I. announced, [Shield at 28%.]

She took a deep breath and let it out slowly and continued firing. Then she rolled to a new position. As she found a firing position, she heard the marines charge the position in front of her.

[Hostiles behind you,] the A.I. warned.

‘Crap,’ she thought. ‘The one place I didn’t throw a grenade.’

She remedied that over-sight by tossing her last grenade, then slid against the inside wall. With everything around her accounted for, she began edging her way toward the marines.

“We surrender,” came a panicked shout, and the firing died down to nothing.

Jian paused to look around. There were still combat effective troops on the ground where the NCO ordered them. They were looking to one another for direction.

Jian canceled her stealth and spoke through her external speaker, “It’s over. Sit cross-legged where you are, hands on your heads. Twitch wrong, and I’ll burn you.”

The two dozen or so troops grumbled as they complied. In the grumbling, she heard, “Should have known. Fucking Coyotes.”