Star Fortress ds-6 Read online

  Once out of range of the lasers, the three meteor-ships began to accelerate and slightly change their heading in a curving angle. It would take a long time for them to loop around so they would be headed in the other direction. By that time, they would be far away from Jupiter and aimed toward the Sun. Once headed that way, Circe would have to decide their destination.

  * * *

  Before the wreckers hit the four Galilean moons, cyborg craft began to decelerate from behind the Uranus projectiles.

  Tan had remained in the deep bunker on Ganymede, watching the holo-screen. Most of the archons had departed, rushing to their private space-yachts, planning to begin the long journey to Inner Planets. The Advisor of Europa was already on a luxury liner, headed for Mars.

  There was a vast exodus from the Jovian System, but ninety-eight percent of the people had no means of leaving. There were riots in the domed and underground cities, mayhem, madness, along with random acts of kindness and generosity. Each Jovian reacted to the coming doom as his nature bade him or her.

  In the bunker, Tan waited in philosophic contemplation. She did not want to live in a world without the examined life. She had fought and struggled too long to run elsewhere.

  Once she realized that Circe’s meteor-ship would survive the battle, Tan sent the Sub-Strategist a last message. In it, she informed Circe of the Fuhl Mechanism, and the possibility that the cyborgs were on the verge of developing an FTL drive.

  Afterward, the days passed until the enemy projectiles became visible to anyone on a Galilean moon’s surface. Then a moment in time occurred, a moment of infamy and extinction.

  In the bunker, Tan reclined on a sofa, with a chalice of wine in her hand. One of the younger girls danced slowly. She was drugged so her eyes gleamed. The girl twirled around, spinning long ribbons gripped in her small hands.

  Tan considered a syllogism as she took another sip of her choicest wine. Looking at the holo-screen, she saw that a moon-wrecker filled it. Tan spotted a crater. In it was a gleaming laser tower. With fantastic speed, the laser grew until she saw its focusing system and then the individual crystals making it up.

  The tip of the chalice remained on her lip. Her heartbeats accelerated as her eyes grew wide. From the corner of her eye, she saw a ribbon and heard a final childish laugh.

  Then the moon-wrecker that had been launched nine-and-half months ago from the Uranus System collided with Ganymede. The impact hurled Tan from her chair so she violently crashed against a splintering wall. The young girl forever stopped laughing as the bunker crumpled and collapsed upon itself.

  A few Jovians survived in various habitats. Some had aimed their telescopes at Ganymede, thereby witnessing a spectacular event of rarest occurrence. The wrecker created much friction, heat and millions of tons of debris.

  All the while, those of the Jupiter System who possessed spaceships continued to accelerate for the last bastion of human life: the Inner Planets.

  -15-

  Far away in the distant Neptune System, the Prime Web-Mind of the cyborgs received data of the successful Jupiter Strike.

  Each of the four Galilean moons had been hit, eliminating the bio-forms on them. Even now, small attack-craft hunted through the system, capturing Homo sapiens on the remaining moons, asteroids and habitats. Many Jovian spaceships had escaped, although half would disintegrate under a barrage of accelerating missiles that followed them into the Great Dark.

  The Prime Web-Mind was on the verge of completing the conquest of Outer Planets. Pluto, Neptune, Uranus, Saturn and now Jupiter were almost under its complete control. An outpost existed on Charon and there was data of an experimental group in the Oort Cloud. Otherwise, the Outer Planets were secured. It was a heady feeling, one that it had always known it could achieve. Reality, however, was so much more enjoyable than simulations.

  Already, the accelerated campaign had begun on Inner Planets. Once the conquest of the Solar System was completed…

  The Prime Web-Mind ran through known data and parameters on the struggle. It tested several new theories, ran through different scenarios and listed several unique hypotheses.

  Once, it had been located on a habitat constructed of weird ice, orbiting Neptune. That had been a frightening time. A single missile could have destroyed its wonderfulness. That would have been a crime of the highest order. Now it was hidden safely in a deep bunker on Triton, one of the few moons with an atmosphere.

  The Prime Web-Mind was a complex cyborg, an exciting meld of man and machine. The primary model was constructed of rows of clear bio-domes. In the domes were sheets of brain mass, many hundreds of kilos of brain cells from as many unwilling donors in the Neptune System. Green computing gel surrounded the pink-white mass. Cables, bio-tubes and tight-beam links connected the domes to backup computers and life-support systems. The combination made a seething, pulsating whole. The bio-tubes gurgled as warm liquids pulsed through them. Backup computers made whirring sounds as lights indicated a thousand things.

  A panel opened on the floor. A small robotic device with multi-jointed arms moved out. At the ends of the arms were laser welders, melders and calibrating clippers. The various arms moved as the robotic device made a routine checkup through the primary chamber.

  Except for a few trivial holdouts in the Jupiter System, on Charon and in the Oort Cloud, it controlled the Outer Planets. The assault-craft and cyborg troops would capture and begin conversion of the last Jovians. Already, a Web-Mind installed itself on Ganymede, although it had sent communications, complaining about seismic shockwaves continuing to reverberate through the moon. Three small ships traveled to Charon to capture the scientists there.

  The Prime Web-Mind paused in its ruminations, playing back an unsatisfying memory. Because of its design and unique functions, the memories had the clarity of a holo-video.

  In a white sterile room, cyborgs strapped a struggling Homo sapien with a high forehead and frightened although shrewd eyes onto a gurney. His shredded robes of office lay on the floor. Despite his advanced age, the human had supple muscles and joints. He was designated as Dominie Banbury, one of the chief capitalists of the Neptune System. Capturing him had cost seven cyborgs and two assault craft, an unwarranted expenditure of hardware.

  Banbury’s personnel were in the process of boarding a cargo vessel and heading to the Number Nine converter. The Prime Web-Mind had recognized Banbury’s uniqueness, the subtly of the human’s mind. It had desired the specialist knowledge and wished to enslave the mind.

  “I will pay good money or services—anything—if you will let me go!” the human shouted.

  The cyborgs ignored the pleas as they remorselessly laid him down and strapped him to the gurney. Dominie Banbury soon began to rave as he thrashed, forcing the cyborgs to immobilize him with their titanium-reinforced hands. They wheeled him into an operating chamber.

  “Please,” Banbury wept. “Let me go.”

  The cyborgs rolled the gurney to a brain extractor, shoving his head into a helmet-like device. The unit vibrated and the lasers began to slice open the skull.

  “No!” Banbury howled, his eyes bulging.

  An injector stabbed his flesh, pumping various drugs into his system. Soon, Banbury’s eyes closed and he breathed evenly, relaxing.

  Twenty-nine minutes later, the unit teased Banbury’s brain-mass from the skull cavity. Normally, choppers would divide the tissue as chemical scrubbers deleted old memories and pathways. The tissue would be rearranged on slates and later inserted into computing gel. Banbury’s fate was different. The Prime Web-Mind desired his memories. Thus, the brain-mass entered an obedience cylinder as a fine web of melds attached directly to the tissues.

  Theoretically, it should have worked. The Prime had run through ninety-seven thousand possibilities. Banbury’s brain had taken the ninety-seven thousand and first choice—suicide.

  It was the first of twenty-nine failures. Twenty-nine Homo sapien minds of unusual quality each chose or inflicted self-eliminati
on rather than exist as a cyborg-slaved brain. The Prime had thus lost the special services of those minds.

  That was a bitter loss indeed. For each of those minds had contained creativity that Web-Minds with their mass integration of human brain tissue lacked. The Prime had not yet discovered the reason for this. And that was angering.

  Therefore, it kept several unmodified Homo sapien scientists and technicians alive in special chambers on Nereid. It tortured critical information from him or her, and it learned what each human feared the most.

  The Prime had long ago concluded that fear was induced, love was given. Therefore, it was better to be feared than loved, leaving the decision of the action to itself.

  I am the greatest being in the Solar System. Thus, it is right that I choose for everyone.

  The scientists and technicians were on the verge of an incredible discovery: an FTL drive. If they succeeded, no combination of events could defeat it.

  The campaign for the Inner Planets was already underway. The Prime Web-Mind was aware of the alliance of the humans. Fortunately, it was too late for the unmodified bio-forms. It had methods for splintering the alliance, as it had agents on several of the worlds. The Highborn were the most dangerous, but they were also incredibly volatile.

  With part of its conscience, the Prime continuously ran through simulations and hypotheses. It had concluded that the Highborn would have one secret weapon it would not discover until the moment of employment. Therefore, it needed the greatest flexibility in order to respond to whatever presented itself. To that end, it had sent several Lurker Assault-ships to the Inner Planets.

  Those stealth missions neared their objectives. Mars was the first on the list. As the humans struggled in their chaotic manner, it would continue the war with unrelenting pressure.

  One other thought gave it pause. The Prime wanted those scientists on Charon. Through a small lead, the tiniest tidbit of data, it now believed a critical human had escaped from Dominie Banbury’s service. If that key Homo sapien added his knowledge to the captured scientists, the breakthrough technology, the FTL drive, was all but assured.

  A feeling of contentment surged through the brain-tissues of the Prime Web-Mind. The war proceeded well within the parameters. The Jupiter System was nearly enslaved and the Mars Stealth Assault would soon enter its next phase.

  Battle for the Solar System

  Seven months pass as the Highborn-Human Fleet travels toward Neptune, as the cyborgs conquer Mars and as Marten Kluge heads for his destiny.

  -1-

  Captain Ricardo Sandoval sat hunched over a computerized tactical map. He was in Salvador Dome on Mars, in an armored environmental chamber, attempting to devise a winning combination against the cyborgs.

  His suit, rebreather and gyroc rifle lay to the side. He wore a ragged uniform rank with sweat. It had been weeks since he’d had a bath. His eyes were red, his face pitted and his morale all but worn down by endless defeats.

  I’m no Marten Kluge.

  His gritty eyes tightened as he adjusted the screen. He wasn’t Marten, but that didn’t mean he was going to give up. You did that when you were dead, or converted.

  Ricardo shuddered. That’s what made this war so bitter, so hateful and evil. The cyborgs didn’t just kill you. They captured and dragged you down to their converter. Mars Command had captured a video of it—the skin-peelers, the choppers, the brain-scrubbers and the mech-melding—what a gruesome process.

  Rubbing his forehead, Ricardo tried to concentrate. It was just a few more days until liftoff. A few more days while the cyborgs overran the planet like a killer virus, infecting one underground city after another. Instead of weakening the enemy with increasing casualties, each attack strengthened the aliens as the cyborgs processed the defeated through the converters.

  You’re running away. You know that, don’t you?

  Ricardo clenched his teeth and tightened his fists. Mars was dying and he wasn’t going to die with it. What else could he do but run? The cyborgs were invincible. Nothing on Mars could stop them and there was no help from anyone—not from the Highborn, Social Unity or the Jovians who had ignored their pleas.

  “Bastards,” he whispered. Ricardo struck the tactical map with his fist. He still remembered the day they had asked the Jovians for help. He had been with Secretary-General Gomez as she spoke to the Sub-Strategist through a long-distance radio.

  The last of the Jovians had three damaged meteor-ships. They had accelerated hard for the Alliance Fleet headed for Neptune, trying to catch up.

  In the environmental chamber, Ricardo adjusted the tac-map, erasing the terrain so Sub-Strategist Circe’s face appeared. It was a fuzzy signal, a poor recording of a conversation several months ago.

  “This is Secretary-General Gomez of the Mars Planetary Union speaking,” Gomez said on the recording. Her voice was clear. “As past allies of the Jovian Confederacy, we now request your assistance. In return, we guarantee you permanent sanctuary on Mars.”

  There had been a long time lag. Ricardo remembered that. The three meteor-ships were far from Mars, as they had swung wide around the Sun in their gently curving loop from the battle against eight moon-wreckers. Ricardo had watched a video of the Jovian-Cyborg battle many times. It had been one of the grimmest things he’d ever witnessed.

  “I’m sorry,” Circe said. In the fuzzy recording, she looked so serious, so intent with the black gem in her forehead. “We cannot assist you at this time. We are on our way to Neptune and are still building up velocity.”

  As he listened to the file, Ricardo remembered Gomez staring at him in disbelief. It had been a hard time. The people of Mars had still believed that victory was possible. The enemy assault had begun with an attack from out of the void. The cyborgs started hostilities by capturing three defensive satellites. One minute there had been peace—the next, cyborgs in vacc-suits swarmed the various satellites, gaining entrance and then control. Afterward, the cyborgs used the Martian arsenal and rained nuclear missiles on selected cities. If that hadn’t been enough, other cyborgs appeared on the surface. They landed in stealth-capsules outside a dome. Once in control there, the hated enemy began putting people into a converter, making more cyborgs. A week later from that dome, a cyborg army had advanced across Mars like an invasion of army ants.

  Even then, the people of Mars had hoped. The three Jovian meteor-ships had seemed like an act of God. Once communication was established, tears had appeared in Gomez’s eyes. That had been before the conversation with Circe.

  “We need orbital control,” Gomez told the Sub-Strategist. “With your meteor-ships, we can destroy the cyborg-controlled satellites. Then we can arm your warships with missiles and pinpoint the cyborg concentrations on the surface, eliminating them one-by-one.”

  “It would be a month before we decelerated enough to reach orbital stability,” Circe said. “Judging by the videos you sent us, the cyborgs will have already conquered too much surface area. They will probably have captured the other defensive satellites by then, too.”

  “We must fight together!” Gomez shrieked. She bent near the com-unit as her fingers whitened around it. “We must save Mars!”

  “Fight by all means,” Circe said in her maddeningly calm voice. “I certainly am. And I understand your pain and dilemma. The cyborgs destroyed the Jovian System. They will destroy Mars, too. Launch what you can and head for Earth. We must fight where there is a chance of victory. At this point, survival of the human race is the goal. You are doomed, and I will not waste my meteor-ships trying to save what is already dead.”

  As he sat in a chamber of Salvador Dome, a haunted place of death, Captain Ricardo Sandoval turned off the recording. The Sub-Strategist had seen more clearly than Gomez. That had been months ago. The cyborgs controlled all but two of the defensive satellites now. The enemy had reached the last free city, killing those who carried guns and dragging others to the converters. There were two converters on Mars now—two of the chamber of horrors
that turned people into the melded enemy.

  Mars Command had tried to destroy one of the converters. Ricardo shook his head. The attack had been a debacle, their Battle of the Bulge—the last gasp to achieve a military miracle. In the end, the Martian attack had burnt-up too many of their own precious military vehicles. They had killed too many of their own hard-to-find soldiers.

  In the dreadful months of war, the cyborgs relentlessly moved from one phase to the next. They had infiltrated the surface and soon gained a beachhead on the planet. Then they landed a converter and then another. Finally, they conquered every place of resistance except for a single remaining stronghold. How did you beat something that fed on the corpses of your own dead?

  If Mars had possessed heavy weapons, perhaps—more planes, tanks, guns and spaceships…

  The communicator beeped.

  Ricardo rubbed his eyes and forced himself to concentrate. He had faced the enemy. He was the great Cyborg Killer, wasn’t he? What a joke. Three times, he had led the Martian Commandoes into battle. Each time, he had killed cyborgs—at the cost of half his force the first time. Then he lost three-quarters of his troops in New Mexico Dome. At Santa Fe Junction, he had escaped the carnage and retreated to his hovercrafts with three Commandoes—three!

  The communicator beeped again. Wearily, Ricardo clicked opened channels. “What is it?”

  Secretary-General Gomez stared at him on the screen. She looked worse than he did, with discolored bags under her eyes.