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  Star Fortress

  ( Doom Star - 6 )

  Vaughn Heppner

  The brutal war enters its final, annihilating phase in this, the sixth book of the Doom Star Series.

  Guided by their inhuman logic, the cyborgs maneuver new planet-wreckers, Lurkers and secretive drone fleets into position. Waiting for the word are massed stealth-capsules, ready to fire cyborg drop-troops onto selected planets, moons and habitats. This time the assaults won’t stop until the cyborgs conquer the Solar System.

  Highborn Grand Admiral Cassius has a deadly new weapon and a plan to defeat the terrible enemy. First, he must assassinate Supreme Commander James Hawthorne, his former ally. Then he will marshal the leaderless Homo sapiens under him, gaining unity of command with Highborn and Humans alike, hoping to lead them to victory with his strategic brilliance.

  Meanwhile, Marten Kluge learns a secret that could change everything. Unfortunately, he is trapped on Earth, a pawn in a growing civil war.

  Star Fortress

  Book #6 of the Doom Star Series

  by Vaughn Heppner

  The Beginning

  -1-

  Defensive satellites ringed the Red Planet in geosynchronous orbit. A few of the satellites were armored with particle shields. Most were half-built structures still under construction. Three were battered wrecks, masses of junk from damage sustained during the Third Battle for Mars.

  Station Santa Anna presently orbited the night-side. It boasted an operational laser, a completed hull and a full array of sensors. Inside the satellite on the bridge, an alarm sounded.

  “What’s going on?” the commander asked. He sat up from where he’d been dozing.

  A warrant officer checked his screen. “It appears the computer has picked up an anomaly, sir.”

  “Where?” the commander asked as he buttoned his uniform. He was a one-armed man, which might have made the buttoning difficult, but he deftly completed the task. “Give me specifics.”

  The frowning warrant officer bent over his sensor equipment, making swift adjustments. “I’m putting the image on the main screen, sir.”

  The commander shoved a cap onto his gray hair as he looked up at the screen. Something black and round plunged through the Martian atmosphere. Even as he watched, the object deployed massive chutes.

  “Give me an—”

  “Sir!” the warrant officer said. “The capsule is composed of an anti-radar polymer, and those are stealth-chutes we’re witnessing. Computer analysis gives it a ninety-three percent probability of being a cyborg vessel of unknown design. It’s obviously attempting a landing.”

  “This is a code eleven emergency,” the commander said, his voice steely. “Activate our laser.”

  “I’m tracking,” the warrant office said. “Sir, the object is headed for a sandstorm.”

  “Weapons!” the commander shouted.

  “Just a minute, sir,” the weapons officer said nervously. “There seems to be a glitch in the system.”

  The commander leaned forward as he stared at the main screen. “Is this their first infiltration or simply the latest of an ongoing effort?”

  People stared at him in horror. Several years ago, there had been a cyborg converter in Olympus Mons. The volcano was Mars and the Solar System’s largest.

  “The object is entering the sandstorm!” the warrant officer shouted.

  “Fire the laser!” the commander roared.

  The stricken weapons officer looked up, shaking his head.

  The commander’s eyes widened as two red spots appeared on his pale cheeks. “Prepare a Chavez Seven missile.”

  “Sir,” the weapons officer whispered. “Those are nuclear-tipped missiles.”

  “Don’t you think I know that?” the commander asked in a harsh voice.

  During the Third Battle for Mars, the Highborn had exploded a Hellburner on Olympus Mons. The missile’s devastating effect had turned the idea of nuclear bombardment into a taboo subject. The fractured moon Phobos had also rained chunks onto the planet, killing even more millions.

  “We dare not let the cyborgs get another foothold on Mars,” the commander said. “Launch now before it’s too late.”

  The weapons officer’s forehead was shiny with sweat as he tapped his screen.

  Through camera five, the bridge personnel watched the missile expel from its tube. In seconds, an orange contrail made it the brightest object against the planet’s dark surface.

  “It needs to accelerate faster,” the commander whispered.

  The seconds ticked away as the race absorbed everyone’s attention. The warrant officer tapped a command. A split-screen appeared, showing the sandstorm that had swallowed the capsule and beside it, the missile headed down.

  “Give me a radar fix,” the commander said.

  The warrant officer shook his head. “Cyborg stealth technology is better than our sensors, sir.”

  Five minutes and forty-three seconds later, the missile entered the sandstorm.

  “They could have landed by now,” the commander groaned.

  Thirty-eight seconds later, there was an explosion, hopefully, detonated by a proximity detector. In any case, cheers erupted on the station.

  “We got it!” the weapons officer shouted.

  “Can you confirm that?” the commander asked.

  The warrant officer hunched over his screen, finally looking up. “No, sir. I cannot confirm a kill, although it seems likely.”

  The commander cursed under his breath. He’d lost his wife and grandchildren to the cyborgs during the Third Battle for Mars. “Maybe this secret vessel launched escape pods, scattering cyborgs before the missiles hit.”

  “That seems highly unlikely, sir,” the warrant officer said.

  The commander took off his cap, setting it on an armrest. As he agonized over his choices, he scratched his scalp. “We must saturate the possible landing zones with nuclear weapons.”

  Three seconds of stunned silence ensued.

  “Respectfully, sir,” the warrant officer said, “that’s a High Command decision.”

  Fitting the cap onto his head, the commander scowled. “Then let’s hope they make the right decision. Patch me through to Satellite Defense HQ. Time is critical.”

  -2-

  Two days later, Captain Ricardo Sandoval of the Martian Commandos struggled through a sandstorm. The storm was the worst red-out in memory, with millions of particles of iron-oxide dust howling around him.

  The cyborgs are dead. What could possibly survive a nuclear holocaust? Ricardo snorted, his disgust growing. This is stupid. Why am I even here?

  He knew that one of the reasons was a nervous High Command. A few generals had wanted to carpet bomb the surface with nukes. Cooler heads had prevailed. To keep the others happy, however, they had sent for him, the leader of the Martian Commandos. Unfortunately, they had placed the most frightened general in charge of the search operation.

  The man had told him, “We could be sending you into something worse than death, Captain. If this was a reinforcement landing and the cyborgs have already built a converter…” The general had insisted on a suicidal procedure. “If you’re captured, the enemy might run you through a converter, changing you into a meld of machine and flesh. For your sake, we can never allow that to happen.”

  Yeah, right, for my sake.

  Through his suit, Ricardo rubbed his gut. For the mission, he had swallowed intestinal explosives that would detonate if he failed to tap in the needed code every half hour. Because of the explosives, every Commando was on stims to keep him awake for the duration of the mission.

  The only danger is these gut-bombs. What a deranged idea.

  Ricardo had thought about declining the assignment.
The reason he hadn’t was that he was one of the privileged: a steroid-pumped Martian with a normal caloric intake. On Mars, privilege definitely meant responsibilities. For Ricardo, it was risking his guts in this storm.

  Knowing the general would check his radio-log later, Ricardo clicked on his suit-com. “See anything?” he asked.

  There were four other Commandos out here with him. The rest were in the APC laager or checking out different coordinates.

  “Negative, sir,” Max radioed. A few seconds later, he added, “What’s your Geiger counter say?”

  “That we’re in a radiation-streaked storm,” Ricardo said. “Keep your eyes open. It would be just our luck that one of those things made it onto the surface.”

  Max laughed, letting Ricardo know the sergeant understood the joke.

  Checking a gauge, Ricardo found that wind-speed had risen to seventy-three km/h. It kept threatening to lift him airborne. Worse, visibility had dwindled so all he could see was several meters ahead. The swirling particles, they were like a living wall, a red shroud, an avalanche ready to bury him on the surface. The only thing worse was the noise. The shrieks were like vibrating spikes driving into his skull.

  Like his men, Ricardo wore a bodysuit and a rebreather. His eyes felt gritty and his breathing was harsh. He had thin features and a spacer’s tan, with a mustache hiding his lips. Despite the polymer visor, hundreds of tiny lines were etched across it. If the particles abraded through the mask, he would choke to death on sand—or would die from a lack of oxygen.

  Ricardo snarled as the suit’s air-conditioner unit whined, trying to cool his overheated body. He clutched a waist-high rock and glanced behind. The others struggled through the sandstorm. Like him, each gripped a gyroc rifle.

  “How much farther are we walking, Captain?” Max radioed.

  “Another two kilometers at least,” Ricardo said.

  The answering oaths and curses made him nod. What a meaningless assignment. He ought to—

  A warning tone beeped in his helmet. Ricardo frowned. That can’t be anything serious. He swiveled his head, watching on his HUD. Another tone sounded. His sensors had picked up something moving out here, something that was heavier than a man. All Ricardo saw was red rocks and swirling sand.

  “Captain,” crackled in his comlink. “I’m picking up something. Could it be a cyborg?”

  The idea intensified Ricardo’s frown. This was a lousy spot for a showdown. Worse, the red-out made it impossible to radio for backup or to warn High Command if it proved they had been right. Who would have believed that?

  “We need to set up a perimeter,” Ricardo said. “Max, take the south. Rodriguez, you have east. Carlos is west and Bandores is in the center to provide a quick-reaction force.”

  The men radioed in, and they took up their positions. As they did, Ricardo recalled Osadar Di, Marten Kluge’s cyborg. He had seen the things she could do: the bounding leaps, the exhibitions of inhuman strength and worst of all, the insect-like speed. He had trained with Osadar and he had listened to Kluge’s combat maxims, which had broadened his thinking. After Kluge’s departure, Ricardo had become the trainer of advanced tactics. His blog had become famous on Mars because of his retelling of his time with Marten Kluge.

  Using the rock as a shield, Ricardo lay on his stomach, letting the storm howl above him. Swirling dust-clouds blew over other rocks and boulders, and created ghost images on his sensors. Tiny particles of iron oxide continuously struck his visor, causing a steady clicking noise.

  Then he saw movement. Was it a rolling rock or was it a cyborg?

  He curled his lips. Kluge had taught them: You don’t win by defending. You attack.

  “I see something,” he radioed.

  “Is it a cyborg?” Max asked. The sergeant sounded nervous.

  “I’m going to find out,” Ricardo said gruffly. “I don’t want anyone panicking. We do this by the numbers.”

  “Roger,” Max said, and the others radioed likewise.

  Breathing deeply, Ricardo crawled out of the rock’s protection into the fury of the sandstorm. The wind slammed against his helmet and almost tore away his gyroc.

  Ricardo gripped his rifle more tightly. Cyborgs moved with incredible speed. They had armored brainpans, graphite bones and reinforced muscles. Computer enhancements gave them speeded rationality to assess in nanoseconds what a man needed seconds or even a minute to decide.

  The howling storm rattled pebbles against his suit. Ricardo looked up. He saw it then. The sight thinned his lips. The cyborg was a dark blot in the sandstorm, and it moved like a jittering fly.

  “It’s here!” Ricardo shouted, with the sound reverberating in his helmet. “Grid seven-B-eight.” He raised his rifle and pulled the trigger. The gyroc fired a .75 caliber spin-stabilized rocket-shell. The rifle was effectively recoilless, meaning the butt didn’t slam against his shoulder after each shot. The shell popped out of the rifle-tube as its mini-rocket-engine ignited. He shot an APEX-round: Armor-Piercing Explosive. The super-hard penetrator used a big motor and a bigger explosive packet.

  Ricardo heard the hisses of other APEX-rounds firing into the storm and whooshing past his head. Unfortunately, the rounds went in a variety of directions, blown off-course by the violent wind.

  “Cease fire!” Ricardo shouted. “We’ll never hit it at a distance. We have to get close.”

  At that moment, the cyborg rose up before him. It wore a metallic-fiber suit, and it seemed unaffected by the wind. With its mechanical-melded parts, it must weigh enough to ignore the lifting power of the storm.

  Ricardo froze. He might have stayed frozen longer, but he had trained endless hours since Marten Kluge taught Martians how to fight. A portion of his training had been in acting fast and then faster yet, to increase his reaction time when surprised.

  Ricardo frantically rolled left as the cyborg kicked a spiked boot at his head. He saved himself, as the cyborg bounded at someone else. It sounded like Bandores screaming over the comlink. Using his booted toes, Ricardo swiveled on his belly. Then he raised his head.

  The thing’s arm was a blur of motion as it hurled a rock, smashing Rodriguez’s helmet. Ricardo swore. The cyborg was too fast for them, especially in this environment. Had it lost its weapons? Is that why it used primitive means to fight?

  “Kill it!” Ricardo shouted, as he surged to his feet. A rocket-shell whooshed past him, a blur of darkness and an orange contrail. It missed his head by centimeters. He couldn’t worry about that now.

  The cyborg reached Max. Something dark moved in its hand as the hand made contact with Max. The third Commando crumpled onto the rocky soil.

  Hatred boiled in Ricardo as he leaped at the thing. The wind lifted him, shoving him fast at the cyborg. Ricardo landed, and he staggered, almost slamming down onto his belly. Like a dancer, Ricardo moved his feet, maintaining balance as the wind blew him.

  The cyborg whirled around.

  In a microsecond of time, Ricardo saw the inhuman eyes, the plasti-flesh face. The cyborg held a dark blade, a wet one—bloody! Without thinking and as he moved into close range, Ricardo shoved the muzzle of the gyroc against the cyborg’s stomach. As soon as he felt the pressure of contact, he pulled the trigger. Just as fast, a knife swiped at him. Ricardo shouted and he twisted. The tip of the blade slashed open his environmental suit. At the same time, the APEX shell in the cyborg’s combat-armor exploded. That knocked the abomination off its feet.

  Ricardo landed on his side, but he scrambled up faster than the injured monster. At the same time, the auto-sealants fixed the breach in his environmental suit. Somehow, Ricardo had kept hold of his gyroc. He shot the cyborg at pointblank range. The shell broke into the cyborg’s helmet. A half-second later, another explosion occurred, ripping away the monster’s faceplate. The thing tumbled back and thudded onto the ground.

  Ricardo tried to fire again, but the creature kicked its leg, smashing the rifle. Then the cyborg attempted to rise.

  By fallen
Phobos, I have to kill it before it kills me!

  As the wind howled and threatened to lift Ricardo airborne once again, he drew a bayonet. As the cyborg climbed to its feet, Ricardo lunged and thrust the bayonet into the thing from Neptune. He stabbed it seventeen times before it died squirming on the sands of Mars. Seventeen times before a red light vanished somewhere behind its eyes.

  Only then did Captain Ricardo Sandoval think about hunting for the surviving member of his squad.

  -3-

  In Far Mars Orbit, a cyborg Lurker-class Assault-ship—L7R325—stopped receiving signals from the surface. The large vessel was composed of black, radar-resistant polymers, built at odd curves, angles and planes to lessen sensor identification. It was not technically a warship, although it possessed a load of stealth-drones.

  It drifted at far orbit, having sailed through the void on built-up velocity and braking with low-signature thrusters. Its design and tactical application was predicated on proven cyborg superiority. It was a troop ship: stealthily approaching the target in order to insert cyborgs and capture it. The Web-Mind in charge of operations presently ran through options as it computed known data on the Red Planet.

  The missile launched from Station Santa Anna told it much about the defensive satellites ringing Mars. It was surprised the stealth-capsule had reached the surface at all. Martian defenses were much weaker than it had anticipated. Yes, the Web-Mind now knew how the Homo sapiens communicated with each other, how they reacted to an insertion invasion and the location of their primary defensive stations. Conquest of Mars…there was a sixty-two percent probability of victory.

  Eighteen minutes after the analysis, the Web-Mind pulsed orders: Load five stealth-capsules with soldiers and the sixth with a converter unit. Once launched, it would fire three black-ice pods, one for each of the key satellites. It would hold five other stealth-capsules in reserve and the second converter as it continued its cloaked orbit.