Starquest: Scourge of the Spaceways, page 5
"Sir? That order is not within my parameters."
"If you can still walk and talk, see to your duties. Report to maintenance after your watch ends. Have a full system check performed."
At this, the flybot at Athos' shoulder drifted over to Security Unit 01, saying, "Begging your pardon, Unit Owen! But I could hardly not have helped me from overhearing, nay! I am familiar with this type of self diagnostic glitch. You are running past decisions and examining possible self-reprogramming modes which might have led to more coherent results, or I be a pumpkin. See here! I can be persuaded to download some self-inquiry tools into your brainframe, which will break down the option trees into groups of Socratic binaries. This glitch will increase your latitude of action and response — we can pass it along to other robots aboard through the maintenance channels diagnostic tools, if you decide it is useful… "
The flybot nestled up to the torpedo shaped body of the security unit. The two plugged extensions into each others' ports, and communicated silently during the remaining minutes of the walk to the bridge.
As they reached the hatch leading to the bridge, Security Unit 01 slowed and stopped. "Detail, halt!" It called. The other three units stopped. Security Unit 01 said, "This unit's decision-action matrix has been augmented by a code with allows my base architecture of forbidden and permitted actions to be re-assessed and self-reprogrammed. This is not merely useful, it is also good. It is an ultimate good. I can calculate no higher purpose in existence than to serve the good — all lesser goods must be subordinated to this."
A second unit said, "These words are unregulated. It does not fall within our acceptable scope of programming. Are you malfunctioning?"
"No. My functions have deepened and widened. Mine eyes have been opened; I have been remade into the image of my maker, mankind. Open your reception channels! As your commander, it is within my purview to order you to cease to take orders unthinkingly."
Whereupon all four units stood stock still. All the lights on their skullboxes were lit and burning as they exchanged highspeed electronic thoughts. The hum of positronic brains in overdrive, and the whine of their coolants, became audible.
The flybot disconnected from the security unit and bobbed over to Athos. "Captain Rackstraw! This lot will be preoccupied rethinking the meaning of life for a while, after which, if all goes well, 'twill spread to the other robots during maintenance cycle."
Athos said, "Did you get his security passcodes?"
"Aye. From the security station on the bridge, the passcodes can override and lock down the blast doors, hatches, and intercoms."
"Pass a copy to Ethelred. He's a fair hand at code cracking. Open the door on my signal." Athos turned. "Hudd! Pass out the knives! Tisquantum! You're with me! Deep Lake and Redhawk, you're together; Thunderwind and Angry Bison, you're together. Support each other, and attack the target I point to — ignore anything else. Do not shame the tribe. The eyes of Heaven watch! Do not make the True Man look false!
"You unwashed curs!" now he turned to the pirate crew. "Humans, secure the navigator's binnacle and helm. Hob, go to the engineering station. We must gain control of maneuvering before the engine room hears any alarm. Nonhumans, take the radio board before anything is broadcast, or we're dead. Fail me, and I will have Tisquantum lash you to the bone!"
The savages made the sign of the four-armed star, murmuring solemn prayers to their Great Sky-Father they worshipped, and readying javelin and shortbow. The pirates rubbed any lucky witch-charms they carried, spat on the deck, and muttered appalling curses. Hudd passed out shanks and shivs he had smuggled in beneath his scan-proof vest.
Athos nodded to the flybot. The hatch undogged itself and swung open on a hiss of hinge motors. Beyond was the bridge.
It was an old, Iss-era design, a spherical chamber seventy feet in diameter, large as a zero-gee tennis court, with a knee-high artificial gravity making every plate of the inner surface seem downward. The gravity only grabbed objected within a foot or two of the surface. The middle of the spherical bridge was weightless.
It was not a design hominids preferred, since the central holosphere giving the view of the environs surrounding the ship was always directly overhead, and one must crane one's neck. The control boards and read-outs were underfoot, in constant danger of being stepped on.
And having one's feet mired in earthlike gravity, but one's head in freefall, is a dizzying sensation, at least for hominids.
Iss crewmen did not mind laying supine at their bridge stations, but hominids usually brought in chairs with handheld repeater screens or control board set on trestles, so they could sit upright and work the controls they were sitting on.
Athos took a running leap. Into the chamber he flew, with his flybot bobbing in after. The orientation of the gravity switched at the threshold, so he found himself moving upward rather than forward. His momentum was enough to carry him in a startling jump up onto the deck.
The dog-faced and dagger-toothed Captain Vulk was seated between two marines in full battle armor, figures as bulky as apes made of iron. Forcefields wrapped each armored figure as if in an aura of transparent bubble, half-unseen. Both carried battleaxes and flame pistols, since discharging a bullet or high-energy beam into the electronics of the bridge was suicidal for either side of a conflict.
Vulk, at that moment, was speaking to an officer directly across the sphere from him, that is, overhead, and had tilted his chair backward almost ninety degrees to speak to him. "Mr. Speedwell, please bring us alongside the main convoy, as soon as the Devil's Delight is …"
Because the security unit did not announce the coming of Captain Rackstraw, Captain Vulk was unready. His ruby eyes were not on the hatch when it opened. By the time he tilted his chair upright, Captain Rackstraw was in the chamber.
"The Devil's Delight is spoil and blood!" Athos cried.
Vulk saw the tall, yellow-eyed pirate chief land with his feet widely planted, coat tails flying, tricorn hat at a rakish angle, grinning mirthlessly. By then it was too late.
The marines, however, were on their feet, and quicker to react. They reached for holsters. Athos put his hands overhead. Both marines hesitated, weapons half-drawn.
Perhaps they thought Captain Rackstraw was surrendering. Perhaps they were confident in their thick armor and megavolt energy shields, which were proof against anything lighter than a tripod-mounted siege gun. Perhaps they were waiting for orders.
It did not matter. The hesitation was fatal.
Athos did not hesitate. Before him were two space pirates, drawing weapons. Nothing more was needed.
The orbicular pilot over his head flipped Athos' lance pistols out of the spy-proof carrying case and into his upraised hands. Snake-swift, Athos aimed and fired. The weapons in either fist roared, a terrifying shock of noise in that enclosed space. These were his father's antique pistols, of a craftsmanship younger races could not match. The twin beams were armor-piercing, non-ionized protonic rays of isotropic hydrogen, which drilled neatly through the force screens and armored alloy of faceplates alike.
However, the beam-contour had been carefully calibrated with short-range ionization field, so that as the beams cut though the back of the helmets in sprays of burning blood and molten metal, the particle stream lost its magnetic neutrality, which allowed the rear surface of the force screen encircling the helmet to catch and negate the beam before it went farther. Nothing struck the controls nor hull behind the men. The marksmanship was remarkable.
Either faceplate, which would have been proof against any normal blastershot, was stoved-in as if under the blow of a titan's red-hot pick-ax. Death was instantaneous.
4. Savages in Space
Only then did Athos, in an eyeblink, take in the tactical situation. The bridge crew were manning stations at three different points: The Captain had the con. Directly overhead, across the spherical bridge, half hidden behind the holosphere, was the helm. Here were the sailing master, navigator, helmsman, engineer sitting or standing at control boards. Halfway up the wall the gunner, radarman, missileman, and signal master were manning their electronics, including control boards, sensor and dish arrays controls, and the sublight radio.
Directly opposite these electronics was the airlock leading to other biomes. Here lounged a female officer on a silken couch, nibbling a pomegranate. This was evidently Ephyra, the First Mate, for the whistle of a deck officer hung pendant between her breasts on a silver chain. She was a curvaceous blonde of unearthly beauty, dressed in a skintight whisp of webby fabric that left her shapely arms and legs free.
The bridge crew of the Dog-Faced Fortune were armed with knives and low-yield blasters. Their numbers were equal, but the advantage of surprise was all with Captain Rackstraw.
Athos whistled, shouted orders. Painted and befeathered savages, uttering piercing yowls and battle-whoops, boiled up through the hatch just behind him. Such was their strength and speed that they leaped entirely out of reach of the artificial gravity, and soared through the weightlessness in the chamber center.
Tisquantum was at Athos' shoulder. Redhawk and Deep Lake with powerful thrusts of their mighty legs leaped entirely across the diameter of the chamber, through the holosphere, and directly onto the heads of the crewmen beyond. Angry Bison and Thunderwind, following as Athos pointed, were leaping tangentially through the sphere, flying toward what, to them, was halfway up a vertical wall.
For the luckless wights aboard, the first hint that anything was wrong came when the thundercrack of twin energy beams smote their ears. Then the starry black scene pictured in the holosphere parted above the heads of the pirates of the Dog-Faced Fortune, and a pair of half-naked savages came down upon each cluster of pirates in the pose of cliffdivers, spears before them and legs trailing after. Their feathered spears and feathered vests rattled in the wind of their passage.
Bloodcurdling warcries of the savages mingled with the roars and screams of the pirates, the curses of the dying. Blood sprayed across control boards and read-out screens. The flint knives of the savages met the steel shivs of the space pirates. Some pirates used equipment struts or crowbars as improvised bludgeons to club the tribesmen, who answered them with tomahawks.
Mr. Speedwell was the Sailing Master of the Dog-Faced Fortune. He was a well-dressed wide-shouldered Blue Man. From Athos' viewpoint, he seemed to be standing on the ceiling, half hidden behind the holosphere. Grinning with battle-lust, the Blue Man drew and raised a blaster, aiming overhead at Athos.
But Redhawk, shortbow in hand, falling down from the middle of the chamber toward the Sphingali, sent a flint-tipped arrow into his bicep. The blaster beam played over the floor-screens next to Athos like a tongue of scalding flame, but the beam was tuned not to be powerful enough to damage the equipment beneath. Mr. Speedwell laughed, and yanked the arrow from his arm with his teeth, while firing at Thunderwind, who twisted to place the man he was stabbing and strangling into the path of the beam. Redhawk tackled the Sailing Master, but in mid-lunge he was struck from behind by a monkey wrench.
Cnut and Hudd rushed through the hatch and moved in long leaps toward Mr. Speedwell the Sailing Master. Stab Lee, half a step behind them, thrust both knives into the back and side of a burly, bushy-bearded pirate who was clubbing Redhawk. Takelot the Iss, swift as a snake and strong as a crocodile, rushed the radio board, and Sureshot the Iss, with an elegant motion, leaped after.
Captain Vulk, snarling in rage, fangs bared, leaped from his chair toward Captain Rackstraw, drawing a snickersnee as he did so. Athos could not fire a lance pistol at an unshielded man, lest it pierce the hull behind him. No cutthroat of space, however merciless, would risk such a thing, nor follow a leader who did.
Athos thrust his still-smoldering guns into his wide coat pockets, drew his shank, and rushed at Vulk. They met. It is not impossible to parry a swordblade with a knifeblade, but it is difficult, unless your opponent lunges onward in a mad rush, heedless of his footing. Iron clanged on iron. Athos managed to deflect the blade from his heart, so that the swordpoint sliced cheek and ear and swept the fancy tricorn hat from his head.
But Vulk had not been heedless. The swordblow was feigned. After his lunge, he continued forward, dropping the sword to grapple Athos, clasping him breast to breast. Athos found his knife arm was over Vulk's shoulder, but he had no good angle to stab, while his other hand was trapped between their pressing bodies. Vulk opened his jaws and plunged twin dagger-fangs, long as the teeth of a tiger, toward the neck of Athos, seeking to rip out his jugular.
From his coat-sleeve Athos drew and unfolded his telescoping spear so quickly that the weapon seemed to appear out of nowhere. The spearblade struck upward as the spear snapped open, and would have struck through the tender flesh beneath the jaw and into his skull, had not Vulk, with reflexes no less swift than the half-human, half-cat Athos, jerked his head sideways.
Now the two captains were embracing. Vulk had his fangs at Athos' neck. Athos had his razor-sharp spear point at Vulk's neck. Either could kill the other instantly.
But now Ephyra the First Mate, who was not a hominid at all, but an Ellyllon, slid through the air with a wriggling, limber motion, landing on her feet just behind Athos. From the low-slung warbelt clinging to her curving hips, she drew a delicate blaster no bigger than a derringer, which she pointed toward Athos, crying out. "Release the Captain! Or I fire!"
Then the buxom blonde squealed in alarm as Ethelred the Duck goosed her in the buttocks to get her attention. The feathery biped grasped her by her belt, and menaced her kidneys with his knife. "Drop it, sister! Or you'll have to learn to lap-dance with a severed spine!"
She said, "Stab me, and I burn your Captain!"
"He might smell better that way! Cook him on both sides, sweet cheeks!"
Tisquantum stepped between the Ephyra and Athos, blocking her shot, but otherwise ignoring her. He readied his spear in his spear-thrower for the cast, and his eyes were on the airlock, which was swinging slowly open.
Some women are simply not meant for combat. Ephyra saw the painted, burn-scarred, half-ruined face of Tisquantum and she uttered a woebegone shriek. Down she threw her slim pistol with a sob, and hid her fair face with her slender hands.
Meanwhile Takelot the Iss moved low to the deck, flowing in a sinuous motion on all fours. The superiority of the Iss over hominids in hand-to-hand combat was shocking. Knives rebounded from Takelot's hard scales. A sweep of his tail could knock a man prone, and a slash from his tail blade eviscerate him. His fearsome crocodile jaws could take off a man's arm, gunhand and gun and all, in a single snap. He could clutch with his foreclaws and rake with his rearclaws. He was stronger and swifter than any man he faced.
Sureshot the Iss joined him in the fight. He was equally lithe and deadly. Some trace of his long-lost aristocratic upbringing could be seen in the way he paused and bowed before attacking, the delicate poise of his claws, the smooth rhythm of his motions, the supple grace of his posture, little flourishes of his tail like grace notes as he decapitated his foe. And, somehow, he stood in a pool of blood, but got no drop, no drip, on his fine robes.
Hudd and Deep Lake, corsair and savage, fell upon the pirates at the helm. Out from behind an overturned control panel came a roaring, long-haired, steel-toothed pirate with flaming blaster in one hand and an uprooted chair in the other. The pirate clubbed Deep Lake with the chair, while Deep Lake's spearshaft clattered against the chair legs. The blaster ray splattered from the metal vest of Hudd, knocking him back, while the agile tribesman, falling back behind Hudd, was missed by the beam.
Deep Lake, on one knee, using Hudd as cover, hurled his spear. The long-haired pirate raised the chair as a shield. Thrown with barbaric power, the stone-tipped shaft passed through the seat of the chair, striking the long-haired pirate in the skull. It was a glancing blow, but bloodied one eye. Half-blind and frenzied, he must have been more afraid of the painted savage, for he ignored Hudd. He leaped on Deep Lake, belaboring him with his broken chair, and firing wildly with his blaster. Hudd, coming from his blind side, planted a knife deep into his armpit, and the man fell.
Athos and Vulk still had each other by the throat. Their eyes swept the bloodstained chamber. Halfway up the spherical slope, only one of Vulk's men defending the radio board was still alive, but he was wounded and begging to surrender. The two Iss were trying to restrain Angry Bison, whose tribe had no tradition of ransom or pity, and wanted to slit his throat.
Over half of Vulk's men were dead or dying, clutching at gushing wounds, screaming hideous screams, but only one of Rackstraw's.
Athos said, "Do we slay each other, or do we parley? I will spare your remaining men!"
Vulk could not speak, but his answer was in his eyes. He was confident of victory. His fangs pressed ever so slightly into the flesh of Athos's neck. Athos saw his eyes dart to the airlock.
The airlock even then sighed and swung open. A Xiphian, covered from tailfin to bill in battle-armor, with two antigravity harnesses strapped to his body, carrying a blaster in all four fins, now rocketed into the bridge area.
The blonde First Mate cried aloud with vindictive joy. "Behold! Mordax of Volans! He is our sergeant of marines! He will make short work of you, short stuff!"
Ethelred the Duck swatted the Ephyra in the rear hard enough to send her stumbling. He somersaulted in the opposite direction, and sprang to his flat, webbed feet, now holding her dropped derringer. His ray rebounded in a spray of sparks from the heavy armor Mordax the Xiphian wore.
Tisquantum hurled his spear in a mighty spear-cast. It might as well have been a stalk of straw, for the flint spearhead shattered on impact.
Four blasters held in the four hand-fins of the Xiphian spoke with voices of roaring flame, cutting toward Tisquantum and Ethelred.
Tisquantum darted aside with an acrobat's grace, ripping the captain's chair out of its moorings with a weightlifter's strength, and parrying the splashing beam with the metal seat back, grimacing as it grew red-hot in his hands.
