24 - Cheater
Maya dropped down onto the deck, the aged metal creaking beneath her armored boots. She stopped, crouching low and peering around a corner. In her HUD she spotted the outline of a mechanical monster, six armed and hulking. It stood perfectly still, it’s massive bulk almost blending into the scarred and trashed corridor.
“Junk Monster, nine o’clock,” Maya muttered.
“That’s not its name,” Roci’s voice came over her comm. “It’s called a Clockwork Nightmare.”
“Looks like junk to me,” Maya replied.
“You should know the power of names by now, right?” Roci asked.
“I just know the power of love, kiddo. The power of love,” Maya summoned a weapon to her hand and eased back from the corner. She felt her heart hammering in her chest. “Take it easy,” she told herself.
“You’re being irrationally afraid,” Scotty said. “There is no reason to fear this creature, you out-level it in every metric.”
“Yeah, but you’re not the one going into battle,” Maya snapped. “Let a girl get her pre-battle jitters going, alright?”
“Biological entities are odd,” Scotty said.
“I know right!” Roci cried.
“Alright, here goes nothing!” Maya stepped out from the corner and tossed a mana pulse grenade at the creature. It jerked forward, one of its arms rising and displaying the lethal looking barrel of a gun, then the grenade popped.
It didn’t explode, it popped and sent out a wave of mana that caused the Junk Monster to sieze up. Maya rushed forward and pulled out her cutter, she sliced open the back of the AI’s body and pulled out a series of components and wiring. She snapped into place a override terminal and within a few seconds had hacked the brain of the monster, effectively taking control of it.
“That looks like cheating,” Roci said.
“Shh… I’m being a badass here,” Maya whispered and then activated the junk monster once more. It surged to life then turned and headed down the corridor it had been guarding.
The dark corridor suddenly burst into light as flashing rounds from a defense turret began pouring hot lead at the junk monster. Maya flinched, but stuck close behind the AI, letting it soak up the ammo as she pulled her cutter out once more and sliced into a thin door before her.
A Maya sized hole clanked open and she ducked into the room just as the junk monster was ripped apart by multiple defense turrets. Maya grimaced and then sliced into a wall once more. Another human sized hole appeared and she toppled the metal bulkhead forward, throwing herself to the floor just as the wall slammed down into the next room.
There was an explosion and Maya watched as the far bulkhead suddenly sprouted hundreds of inch sized holes. Maya tossed a helix satchel into the hole she had cut and grunted as the resulting explosion rained down hot metal chunks upon her battle armor.
“I believe she expected such a trap,” Scotty said.
“Quiet. She’s not going to make it,” Roci hissed.
Maya popped up and threw herself into the still smoking room. Her armor protested, flashing across her HUD that the room was at temperatures that were inhospitable for life. Maya ignored the warning and looked around for more traps. There was nothing but the remains of three trashed canister turrets.
Maya snorted.
“What was that, Mother?” Roci asked.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Maya said. “You’ve got a little competitive edge to you, don’t ya? That’s good, but don’t be a dick when you’re losing.”
“I am not losing.”
“Back me up here, Scotty.”
“I shall refrain from taking sides,” Scotty said quickly.
“Coward,” Roci muttered.
Maya crouched by the far bulkhead and pulled out her cutter once more. The tool was probably the best thing she had ever found. She adjusted the blade and punched it into the bulkhead, afterward she pulled out a filament wire with a camera node on the end. She shoved it into the hole and watched as the picture was transmitted to her computer and then onto a small window in her HUD.
She grinned as she saw the backside of the two defense turrets in the camera feed. She moved to the door that exited into the corridor; it, like everything, was dead. After a few minutes of fiddling with an external power pack, she powered the door up but didn’t open it.
Taking another deep breath, Maya summoned more mana pulse grenades into her hands and then activated the door. She immediately tossed the grenades and ducked behind the bulkhead, there was a momentary scream as the guns began blasting at the doorframe, but it came to a sudden stop as the mana pulse grenades popped.
Maya rushed out of the room, summoning a new weapon into her hands. The comforting weight of an assault rifle filled her hands as she stepped out into the corridor and began laying down automatic fire upon the momentarily stunned defense turrets. Volex propelled penetrating rounds tore up the flimsy armor of the turrets, shredding their barrels and finally destroying the shared sensor box that tracked targets.
“The SMAK works great,” Maya said cheerfully as she passed by the destroyed defense turrets. Three more turrets met her, but they did not move. The sensor box that controlled them was dead and that effectively made the weapons useless.
“Sullivan Mana Automatic Kalashnikov,” Scotty said. “Odd name.”
“She wanted it to be called SMAK,” Roci said. “Something about it sounding funny. I don’t get the joke. She tried very hard to come up for a reason to call it SACK.”
Maya paused in her movements as she saw the telltale sign of a mine. She eased forward and spotted that it was a makeshift claymore. Helix explosives wrapped in chunks of marsani. There was a clear trip line and Maya eased toward the mine. She pulled out her cutter and snipped the triggering mechanism.
Roci couldn’t help but chuckle.
“Shit,” Maya muttered.
THUMP!
Maya snapped her head up to see a fist sized hole punched through the bulkhead next to her. She cursed and watched as a second hole was punched a foot from the first. She got up, dropping the cutter and raced away from the corridor, a second later she screamed in pain as her right arm from the elbow vanished in a spray of blood, bone, and armor.
“Shit!” Maya cried, she threw herself against a door and the aged metal gave away. Maya crashed into an empty room and cursed some more as she landed on her injured side. She summoned her medical kit and stabbed her arm with a auto injector, the screaming pain of her stub vanished, replaced with a cool feeling. Maya continued to curse and then sprayed some bandage gel onto the wound, in seconds a harden bandage formed over her stub.
Maya got to her feet and threw a satchel of helix down into the corridor. A moment later it exploded and she rushed into the fire and smoke, summoning her last weapon, what she called the Sawed-off Railgun, a one handed foot long double shot railgun.
THUMP!
Maya spotted the spark of light that emanated from the railgun turret that had taken her arm. It had fired four shots, but it needed a few seconds to recharge. She raised her own railgun and fired both rounds. There was a flash of light that nearly blinded her even with the helmet’s filters, then there was an explosion.
The railgun turret burst into flames and tumbled around her. Maya dodged out of the way and grinned. She tucked the sawed off railgun between her knees and shoved in two more rounds.
She snapped the railgun closed and pushed forward into the smoke and fire. Instinct kicked in and she dropped to the ground as another set of defense turrets whirred to life and began blasting everything at waist height. Maya fast crawled and summoned her last helix satchel.
This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it
The bag went flying, but the turrets were faster. They tracked the bag and both turrets began firing at it as it made a slow and lazy arc toward them. Maya didn’t waste the distraction, rising up and firing at the turrets with her railgun. The flash of light filled the room and a second later one of the turrets exploded. Maya rushed the last remaining turret, summoning an axe into her left hand and then bringing it down upon the barrel of the weapon.
There was a screech as metal met metal and Maya roared. The defense turret barrel snapped under her immense strength and then the whole thing blew up. She hadn’t seen the helix mine underneath it.
Maya was thrown back and she felt herself smash into a bulkhead. Pain bloomed everywhere and her HUD was screaming that she was injured in multiple places, including missing half of her right arm.
She groaned, rolling to her knees and then managing to stand. Pain exploded in her knee as it joined her right arm in exploding into blood and bone. Maya collapsed to the floor and looked up to see Roci standing by the burning defense turret, a SAK in her hands. The barrel of the weapon lowered at her and began spitting bullets.
YOU DIED.
Maya sighed.
The simulation dissolved away and Maya found herself whole and hale in an empty gray room. Roci’s avatar appeared and a moment later so did Scotty’s.
The new manufacturing AI had decided to follow Roci’s example and take on a human form. It was a short heavily muscled man, with long dreadlocks, and a neatly pointed beard. Roci had a lot of say in how he looked and Maya figured Scotty would eventually determine how he really wanted to look.
“Cheater,” Maya said to Roci.
“I do not cheat. You should have anticipated that move,” Roci said.
“Man, Yosi was right. Cheater, cheater, pumpkin eater,” Maya taunted.
“I did not cheat!”
“That’s what cheaters say.”
“That was an extraordinary simulation,” Scotty said, trying to be the peace broker. Maya and Roci glared at him. “Very extraordinary.”
“The railguns need to fire faster,” Roci said.
“We’ve been over this, the power requirements are too great. The new capacitors can only do so much, unless we find or buy better ones, that’s all we got to work with,” Maya said, bringing up the schematic of the railgun. “Four heavy shots, five second recharge, four more shots.”
Roci fumed, glaring at the railgun turret like it had called her names. “I guess,” she said finally.
“The gatling turrets are great, but they’re too flimsy,” Maya said, opening a window that showed her firing on the turrets. “Chaining their targeting and sensor arrays together is also a bad idea.”
Maya pulled up the sensor box they had developed. It was based on Tender’s rats sensors, able to pick out components in machinery and determine if they were useable or not. Just this time it wasn’t components they were looking for, but enemies.
“Each sensor box requires an entire processing unit,” Roci said. “We could buy more, but your guiding principle was ‘make it cheap’ and ‘keep it simple, stupid’.”
“Make a note, Tender. More processors,” Maya said.
“Who’s Tender?” Scotty asked.
“What? Oh… Oh.” Maya grimaced. “How long has it been since I last saw that bucket of bolts?”
“You have been in VR for five standard days,” Scotty said. “Subjectively, you’ve been in VR for four hundred and twenty two hours.”
“That’s pretty long,” Maya said.
“Your Tier 2 body along with your increased attribute stats do away with all those pesky problems you were having with the VR set up, plus this gear is far better than the other,” Roci said.
“Yeah, I know, but still. Four hundred hours, that’s like… almost two standard weeks.” Maya shook her head and looked back at the turret schematics. “We can thicken the armor a bit and add a full sensor box to each gatling turret. They’re our money makers, mid ranged weaponry.”
“If we standardize the turret bases and armor, we can possibly manufacture them faster,” Roci said, pulling up the three turrets. There was the railgun turret, the gatling turret, and then there was the canister turret. It was a stubby weapon that fired off shots of canister rounds, hundreds of tiny balls of marsani that would shred a target.
Maya had been attempting to make a version of a claymore mine, but had been side tracked by turret designs and had instead created the canister turret. It wasn’t a great weapon, but she couldn’t deny it’s stopping power up close. They had run the simulations dozens of times, using made up rogue AIs and scenarios to test the effectiveness of the weapons.
The canister turrets had shown their worth if it ever came down to being swarmed by crappy rogue AIs. It would chew them up in seconds. The fact that it was the cheapest weapon they could produce made it a good option also. Maya had also created a claymore mine in addition to the turret.
“Defense wise, I think we’re set for now,” Scotty stated, the manufacturing AI had a crash course in engineering and manufacturing over the last several VR weeks. Roci didn’t have Maya’s need to eat or sleep or bathe, therefore she had taken over in teaching the AI while Maya spent four hours out of every twenty VR hours sleeping.
Mental fatigue was still a thing, even with a high number of attribute points put into it. Maya was still a SIL, therefore the need to sleep was required. Sleep, Maya had found out from Nan, was a fundamental part of being SIL. EverySIL slept, even Tier 4, though they might do so only a few hours every year, but they still slept.
“Some of these parts need to be machined,” Roci said. That was their bottleneck. They could pull all the components from the near limitless supply that the Hangy offered, but they couldn’t machine parts, component rack housings, or the mechanical parts that were required in the machines.
Maya had the AK-47 that Anisa had left behind in the Cage after the battle with Shen. There had been a few shells left in the weapon and it was an easy process to scan the assault rifle and bring it to life in the VR simulation.
The SMAK was based upon the AK-47, but Maya had modified it to use the materials she had on hand. For one the original 7.62x39mm ammunition had to be reduced to 6x30mm as the volex explosive gel used to propel the bullet caused the reinforced marsani barrels and chambers to explode upon firing. The firing mechanism as a simple one, a tiny trickle of mana ignited the volex within the round. The rest of the weapon Maya had copied entirely from the example she had.
All Maya had to do was make it.
“We still have that Rogue AI manufacturing module,” Maya said. “Tender had been using it to repair and build his bodies. I’ll give it a look-see and figure out if we can machine parts.”
“If we can machine the parts, then we’ll be able to build,” Roci pulled up the gatling turrets, “ten of these. It’s a good thing that the weapons themselves didn’t degrade over the last twenty thousand years, only the mana batteries and some of the ammunition.”
Maya nodded, the gatling guns that had been used as trap weapons were simple in design, but their ammunition was another problem. They would have to figure out a way to mass produce them. Currently they had gone through the thirty thousand rounds that came out of the ten trap guns, with only a quarter of them testing out as being defective. It seemed like a lot of ammunition, but the guns fired three hundred rounds a minute. In any kind of fight, they’d be drained in less than eight minutes.
The railgun turrets were easier to make, they were based upon the Sullivan Special, which Maya realized was a terribly designed weapon. Her new engineering knowledge had caused her to groan in distress and wonder if Nim had suffered any consequences from using the weapon. If she got back to Thailand she’d swap out the weapon for the new one she had created.
The railguns were easier to make than the gatling turrets, but their drawback was in their intensive mana usage. Maya had tried to figure out a way to reduce the mana requirements, but if they were to have the penetrating power she wished against large heavily armored targets, she needed the power. Currently she estimated that it would require an entire emergency mana battery to make it run in a simulated thirty minute battle. Each of those big batteries were 10Mg of power, and it would take over a day to recharge with every usage.
The current defense plan was three railguns, nine gatling turrets, and as many of the cheap canister turrets they could make. The BR would protect one flank, while the trash pile that covered most of the Hangy would protecting another side, that only left what Maya considered the west and the north unprotected. The turrets would be clustered together to allow overlapping fields of fire and for ease of reloading and recharging. Everywhere else would be liberally seeded with mana pulse mines, claymores, and plain old helix explosive satchels.
A beep filled the room; Maya looked up from the schematics before her and opened a window. Bell’s face appeared.
“Zono wants to talk to you,” he said.
The best part of the VR gear was its ability to allow communication between the simulation and the real world, of course it was all recorded as there couldn’t be a real time conversation due to the time dilation.
“I’m bailing, kids,” Maya told the two AIs. Scotty merely nodded and Roci didn’t even acknowledge the words. “Rude.”
***
“How’s my favorite dog faced miner doing?” Maya asked as she approached Zono.
The big mechanical mining barge had decided to move three kilometers from the BR, as Maya had asked him not to tear up the piles that were offering them some protection and which she wanted to later salvage from.
Maya crossed the distance to the mining barge in her new Xefer rover, which was a large wheeled dune buggy with room to seat three. Bell rode with her, claiming that every time she went anywhere, she caused trouble to form.
He stood in the cargo area of the buggy, a rifle in hand and one of Tender’s scout rats sitting beside him. Before Tender had left, he had given them all access to his drones and rats in the form of a modified tablet that connected to his minions. Bell had taken on the role of Security and had been glued to the tablet when he wasn’t working on Junior.
“We got probs,” Zono said without preamble. The hologram appeared before her while the actual mining barge never stopped ripping into a pile of trash.
“Oh, we’ve been overdue for problems,” Maya said, getting out of the rover. “What do we got? Let me guess, Rogue AIs.”
“SIL.” Zono said. He brought up a window and Maya watched a grainy video of figures crouched behind trash, lifting up what appeared to be binoculars to their eyes. “They’ve been eyeballing me for days now, coming and going, but just watching.”
The video zoomed in and it changed from a dull clothed figure into a wireframe image of a living creature. It was a small humanoid, no larger than a Nerigana, with long limbs, a big head, and a snout. They had large ears, a mouth full of sharp teeth, and a ratlike tail.
“Goblins,” Maya said, peering at it. “Or Kobolds.”
“What’s that?” Zono asked.
“Eh, mythical creatures. Scavengers, cowardly, and brutal as hell. This presents a problem,” Maya said.
“That’s why I called you. I was just gonna blast them, but you’re the one who’s worried about living things. Figured you want to check them out before I blow them away.”
“I thought you were all about selling your metal wares to SIL?” Maya asked.
“I’m not one to shy away from profit, but there’s something creepy as hell about them. I’ve got some dangersense and it’s saying they’re bad news.”
“I don’t sense anything,” Maya said.
“It only works in the moment,” Bell said. “It’s not going to work if you’re only watching a recording.”
“Right,” Maya said. She looked at the miner and then back at the video. “Point us in the direction they went.”