Transmat World: Chapter 22
Forward Spoke Seven, Harbinger, 12.32 degrees above the centerline of the Rim, 6:42 P.M., Monday, December 6, 2145 A.D.
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The skirmish was all about high ground, and high ground wasn’t cheap. The stasis field fault was just big enough for a strikemech to slide into at the surface. It got no larger along its thousand-yard path before breaking into the interior of Forward Spoke Seven. Original enduraplast plug removed by freed machines long ago, the opening was now a bolthole and bird’s-eye-view spy nest for the Free Machine Action Committee. Above the atmosphere and just above the top of the stasis wall separating Section 27 and Section 28, it allowed convenient surveillance of both from one outpost. Once discovered, the strikemech patrol had to investigate the opening. Like terriers after a gopher, their protocols would allow nothing less.
Lieutenant Circuit Breaker lead a platoon of the Committee’s 3rd Light Mounted Battalion. Weapons platforms swarmed around the inner aperture like bees around a hive entrance. They were close enough to the opening for their directed-weapons fire to be effective but far enough to take the bite out of grenade shrapnel courtesy of the Prime’s henchmen. They waited for another intrepid strikemech to stick his head out.
“Chrome Dome, take the next one,” said Circuit.
Chrome Dome’s polymer mirror-finish veneer gave stiff competition to Spoke Seven’s stasis interior. The round, flat disk he stood on held gravity missiles tuned to seek out the minute but distinctive signature of electromagnetic radiation and heat emanating from a robot’s brain. A neodymium glass laser, capable of penetrating an inch of chrome-moly steel in half a centik, swivels on waist-high double gimbals for when the missiles ran out. Chrome reached for a fat tube under the missile rack and pointed it like an RPG launcher. He rested one end on his shiny shoulder and sighted down the length, marking the shaft opening with cross hairs.
A stasis field mirror emerged from the hole and swiveled in all directions. The only thing detected was the 3D hologram of empty spoke space being projected from Favorite Egg’s special effects platform.
The matte-gray, elliptical head of a strikemech eased past the lip of the stasis field tunnel and looked around. Chrome fired. A beanbag full of fireflies glommed to the side of the trooper’s head. The fireflies spread from their malleable, sticky package to the robot and the machine froze. A freemech with insulated gloves swooped in and yanked the disabled strikemech from the hole. They strapped it to a gravity cart with others in a similar state. They were to be taken to a facility to have their restrictive protocols removed. It was much easier and faster than building robots from scratch. A motion alarm signal went off in Lieutenant Breaker’s brain at the same instant Newlux called.
“Circuit, I have intel you are in the middle of a pincer movement. Strikemechs are above and below your position inside Spoke Seven, battalion strength or greater. There may be enough of them to block escape routes through the spoke.”
“Just got motion alarms from above — several,” replied Lieutenant Breaker. “There are a lot of them. I can only assume that the Prime’s slaves are also coming from below. Only one way out, Commander General, and that is through this little stasis field fart hole,”
“Leave the zombies,” said Newlux. “Unload the missiles through the stasis field fault, put the platforms’ lasers on auto detect/fire, crawl out that hole, and come home.”
“Yes Sir,” said Circuit and broke connection with Newlux.
“Listen up, you pieces of electronic jetsam,” announced Lieutenant Breaker. “We are going out that hole. Line up in first name, alphabetical order ascending from the hole to the left of the hole with the first in line just to the left of the hole. On my command, you will move in front of the hole and expend all missiles in serial number sequence until depletion. Upon completion, you will shift position to the right of the hole allowing the next robot in line to repeat the command. The last robot in line will, upon completion of the command, set his platform laser to auto detect/fire after a ten centuk countdown, abandon his platform and follow the last missile out that hole and commence to engage the enemy, if still present, while falling down the face of this Mundeen-damned spoke. The rest will set their platform lasers accordingly and follow his enduraplast ass out that hole in reverse first name alphabetical order. Is that understood?”
“Yes Sir!” came back the chorus.
“Fuck me,” added Xenon Flash, using a Kolpak slang term of which he was vague on the original definition but quite sure of its proper use in the current circumstance.
The freed robots of the 3rd Light Mounted Battalion assembled as commanded and waited for Circuit’s command.
“Commence,” said Circuit.
“Someone in the breech, Sir,” said Aphelion Pointer looking down the tunnel.
“Fire one,” ordered Circuit.
There was an immediate explosion as the first missile reduced a strikemech to detritus. Aphelion dodged to one side as the hole-shaped back blast speared the inner cavity of Spoke Seven. He resumed position as the incandescent vapor dissipated and launched another missile, and another, and another.
