Vesta, The Belt, June 23, 1000 Solar Era
Commander Zulu and her few remaining lieutenants had their neuro circlets confiscated and bodies searched for weapons. They were then escorted aboard Starship Oneiroi.
Commander Zulu was rather curious about the new neurorevo-designed A-class starship, but it was the sight of Jen that flabbergasted her.
“You… you’re Jennifer MacLeod!” She exclaimed, stopping the escort in their tracks. “My fiance on Earth stated that he saw you at yesterday’s ball! You… how are you here?!”
Bone became impatient-- he was the one leading the escort.
“Keep moving! She has always been here!” He pointed the barrel of his pistol and intimidated Commander Zulu to continue walking. These remaining EFSF soldiers were promptly imprisoned in the brig.
Meanwhile, Senior Zseven was in the EFSF military center, recalibrating all the remaining defense on Vesta to serve their needs.
Shortly, five martian ships cruised into the vicinity of Vesta, having jumped to safe space relatively close to the resource transfer node. They quickly descended into the docking bay of Vesta that Starship Oneiroi was already resupplying at.
By Vice-admiral Zheng stood not only Khan, but also another man in an exosuit. This man was Lieutenant Jacobs, an ace nexarm pilot under Vice-admiral Laurent. Vice-admiral Zheng had been chosen by Admiral Sullivan for this mission, and Vice-admiral Laurent had expressed that he deserved to have a share of the glory. Thus, Lieutenant Jacobs had accompanied them here on his B-class starship.
If anyone observed closely, they would easily notice Lieutenant Jacobs marching confidently at a distance from Vice-admiral Zheng. Zheng had no personal conflict with Jacobs, but he had quite a number of disagreements with Vice-admiral Laurent on the very core of their ideology and methods. Jacobs was clearly a man that belonged to Laurent.
“Grand Elder Enine!” Zheng saluted the T3ST colony’s leader who was already waiting on the docks for him.
Enine saluted awkwardly in return. He was no military man.
They entered a private room in the docking facility and removed their helmets. Their feet stuck to the ground thanks to the technology on their spaceboots. If they entered deeper into the civilian area within Vesta, they would no longer have to rely on these boots with the existence of the artificial gravity within, created from a combination of rotating mechanisms and electrically-induced field.
“Any complications?”
“Yes.” Enine creased his forehead. He hadn’t quite expected this complication. “The civilians operating Vesta are in protest.”
“The cause? They have no reason to dislike us.”
“This.” Enine slid a hologram that presented 3D image and reports. “One of my sons recklessly sent a few crab swarms inside the civilian area…”
“You adjusted the mission plan for this?!” Zheng was exasperated at the turn of events. The original mission plan had clearly stated not to threaten the civilians. They needed them on their side.
“Well, we did adjust the plan to suit our combat personnel. But no. One of our nexarm pilots independently decided to send a few swarms in. I’m ashamed to say it was one of my sons.”
“Not the one who wishes to avoid combat, surely?”
“The other.”
Zheng took a deep breath and exhaled, his cheeks expanding in frustration. Deep down, he had a feeling that the T3ST unit would cause issues. They weren’t actual military personnel. But Mars needed them for their ability to control an extravagant number of neuro devices.
“Vice-admiral,” Lieutenant Jacobs was nonchalant. “Just inform the protestors that this was committed by a volunteer group from the belt not fully under martian control. This is actually perfect.”
“Bone, was it?” Jacobs had screened the T3ST colony when that information was on Vice-admiral Laurent’s desk. “In fact, let him go free and etch fear upon these people. We martians will be the saviors.”
Zheng, Khan and Enine all frowned. Grand Elder Enine certainly had no desire to be turned into a scapegoat for Mars. At the same time, he could not speak out, with Bone being his son and the cause of this complication.
“We will do as Lieutenant Jacobs says. Grand Elder. Ensure to keep Bone in check in the future. How are the current defenses?”
Vice-admiral Zheng spent the next thirty minutes obtaining all the information on the battle as well as Vesta that the T3ST unit had collected.
When the three began returning to their ship, Jacobs veered off towards Starship Oneiroi.
“Jacobs?”
“Vice-admiral. I’m just curious. They say that one of the nexarm units is malfunctioning and only one-in-ten can activate it. Rumors have it that only someone special can control it. The primary pilot doesn’t even wish to fight! Right now, we Mars have four units and this… T3ST unit have four as well. We should have five. It was not wise to gift the T3ST colony a total of four units.”
This was precisely why Zheng did not get along with Laurent. Vice-admiral Laurent thought in such fashion as well, and the officers promoted under him shared this style of thinking.
Normally, he would reject this request, but Zheng was rather torn. He was curious about that malfunctioning nexarm as well. At the same time, he feared that Jacobs would be a source of trouble and create friction with the T3ST unit.
“Lieutenant. This is an order. Do not board the T3ST unit’s ship.”
Jacobs stopped in his tracks and his face contorted for a second before returning to normal.
“Yes, vice-admiral.” His fists clenched in dissatisfaction as he returned to his B-class ship.
Zheng and his right-hand Khan returned to their triple-barrel S-class starship and called for a meeting of their key officials and officers. The state of Vesta was relayed and the public relations officer on board was sent to publicly communicate with Vesta’s inhabitants.
The martians were to deflect the blame onto the T3ST unit. The T3ST unit were to immediately leave Vesta and Bone would be punished appropriately. The issue was Bone was only a volunteer member and did not even fall under martian command.
The public relations officer resolved to ‘make something up’ and decided to claim that certain EFSF spies had chosen to escape into Vesta and hide among civilians, the true cause of the swarms being sent into Vesta. Thus, as long as Bone did not appear for a few subsequent battles, no one would realize that it was rather unlikely for the T3ST unit to persecute him in any substantial way.
Zheng scrubbed his hands clean in the restroom before readjusting his uniform and re-equipping his exosuit before activating his comms.
“Khan.”
“Yes, sir?”
“Go and check on Jacobs.”
“Yes, sir.”
He returned to the bridgehead and motioned for the ship to use its outstanding functions to start a connection with the far-off martian command.
Before he could even activate a connection, Khan’s frantic voice sounded in his ears.
“Vice-admiral! Jacobs boarded the T3ST’s starship!”
Zheng immediately rose back to his feet.
On Starship Oneiroi.
Jacobs had boarded the ship in his exosuit. The T3ST members on the ship glanced quizzically at the man, but they continued about their day knowing of their cooperation with the martians.
“Where’s the malfunctioning nexarm?”
“That way,” A passing engineer pointed in the direction of the hangar. “But it’s best not to try anything with the unit. Honestly, not even us engineers understand why it only functions for specific pilots. For all you know, the whole neuro-frame might go haywire the next moment.”
Jacobs’ was a B-class starship. Thus, he didn’t fully know his way around an A-class ship yet. Vice-admiral Zheng had not bothered to give him a tour of the other ships. Otherwise, he would not have needed these people’s directions.
Jacobs scoffed in his mind. These belt folks are just a means-to-an-end. Once they defeat the terrans, the belt’s inhabitants would simply have to continue mining resources. Mars citizenship? Citizens must contribute.
He entered the hangar and found his sight sweeping across four docked nexarms. He only had eyes for one unit in particularly-- the unit that was slightly bulkier due to mining tools that remained hidden within its compartments. That was naturally Nexarm Chimera.
He strode confidently towards his target, and as he slotted his foot into the hook that lifted him up towards the cockpit, an engineer finally noticed him.
“Hey! You’re not allowed in here!”
It was too late.
Jacobs jumped into the cockpit. He would take this nexarm back to the martian forces. Its pilot wasn’t even interested in fighting the war!
He attempted to sync his neuro circlet to the nexarm.
User connected.
He grinned and bid the nexarm to walk forward… only to receive no response. The unit remained in a complete standstill. It was as if he hadn’t given any neuro commands to the unit at all!
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He had never encountered this with the unit given to him.
“Move, damned unit!” He stood from his seat and moved around the cockpit slamming his hands against the spherical surface in hopes that the unit would suddenly obey his commands.
Then, he thought of how the T3ST unit’s members would laugh at him if he were to leave without forcing this unit to move,and began hammering down on the spherical cockpit even harder.
User’s mental function unstable. Mental Evaluation is recommended.
The phrase said with the AI voice of the nexarm fully enraged Jacobs. However, before he could even react to the provocative recommendation, the cockpit door swung open and a strong intake of air through vents that had opened within the spherical cockpit flushed Jacob out the wide open door.
Jacobs forcefully activated the spider arms of his exo-suit, which sprung out and wrapped around his body. The slightly elastic nature of the spider arms barely saved the man from injury as he landed and rolled a few meters across the ground.
Perhaps if he calmly left the cockpit, no one would have mocked him or it. All the engineers knew of the odd malfunction.
Yet, to see how he was shot out of the cockpit in such a miserable state… Quite a few engineers who happened to see the sight clutched their bellies as they uncontrollably laughed out loud.
The hangar suddenly shook, vibrating the visions of every personnel on Starship Oneiroi. Many felt as if they were standing directly above an earthquake. That only continued for a few seconds.
When Jacobs steadied himself by aligning his vision with the ground, he shockingly noticed the shadow of a large foot over his very own figure. He instinctively side-rolled and barely avoided being crushed by Nexarm Chimera’s foot.
The shaking earlier had loosened the equipment keeping the nexarm locked safely in their docking bay within the hanger!
Nexarms had certain internal functions that would auto-activate to keep it standing. In attempting to balance itself after the ‘earthquake’, the nexarm’s foot had nearly crushed Jacobs, who had been previously expelled to a position close to its feet.
“Sorry all.” A voice drawled through the ship’s comms. “Did not expect that to happen when I tested the mega-particle beam cannon.”
Despite the internal earthquake, the engineers resumed whisperings in each others’ ears while sharing secretive chuckles, having rather enjoyed the unexpected excitement after their dour resupplying work day.
Jacobs grinded his upper and lower jaws against one another. He was the ace pilot of the martian forces! To have nearly been flattened by a nexarm’s foot due to the idiocy of this colony’s personnel on top of being flung out by the nenxarm…
Jacobs lost his head. He withdrew a pistol that instantly quietened the engineers, all backing away in fear.
Jen had been notified of some interloper that had attempted to control Xeight’s unit, and had only just arrived at the hangar.
“Oi, you! What do you think you’re doing!” She yelled at who she perceived to be a madman.
Jacobs swung the pistol in Jen’s direction. “You are?”
“I’m the nexarm’s engineer!”
“So you’re the bitch who programmed the AI to reject my commands! Now, reprogram this unit so it can be of real use to the war effort! You can even become the martian ace pilot’s personal engineer!” He had begun to attract quite a crowd with his hysteria.
“You dimwit! We haven’t even diagnosed what the issue with it is!”
“Don’t make shit up! I give a neuro command. It follows it! How hard can it be!” Jacobs believed that these engineers were mocking him. It was just a neuro signal! The system would receive the signal and activate the movement on the nexarm and the accompanying devices!
“Here!” Jacobs violently grabbed a random engineer that was trembling with his hands over his head. “If you don’t fix the programming, this engineer will lose his head!”
“We really have no idea you--”
“After this engineer is dead, there will be another! I will clean this whole place of you filth until you fix that nexarm unit!”
“Drop your weapon!” Xeight appeared. He was also in his exosuit with the spider arms extended, and he, too, held a pistol which he pointed directly at Jacobs.
“Oh please.” Jacobs was not at all concerned with the pistol being pointed at him. “All of you are only here because of us martians. Even if I were to kill a few of you, at worst I’d just get reprimanded! You’re nothing! Now, if you were to even attack me, my vice-admiral will ensure that one day your single colony will pay the price!”
“I suppose you are right,” Xeight replied as he lowered his weapon. “And yet. You need us. Look at you. Pointing a pistol at an unarmed non-combatant. A wretched coward borne of a bitch’s wide-open legs. You should transfer more nexarms to our T3ST unit. They are wasted on those of your ilk. What was it that terrans said about you martians…? Even with increased oxygen, after you treat the rust outside, you only find brains as smooth as polished iron.”
Xeight rarely partook in games of insults. Luckily, James MacLeod had passed on a few to him.
“I dare you to shoot, coward.” He scoffed at Jacobs as he turned and declared to his compatriots. “This is the true face of Mars! Do you see clearly now?!”
Jacobs’s mind short-circuited as if to prove Xeight’s words to be true. Little did Xeight know that… Jacobs was fatherless through his upbringing.
He maniacally repeatedly pulled the trigger on his pistol.
Xeight was prepared. He had never expected this man to show up, but in his mind, this was a golden opportunity and thus he pounced. His sensory devices within the exosuit had long been observing Jacobs’ every twitch of the muscle.
He wasn’t entirely sure how many neuro channels Jacobs had, so he couldn’t be certain how many different functions of the exosuit the martian could activate. Regardless, he had full confidence in himself, having piloted a nexarm for much of his life.
His exquisite control over his spider arms and his connectedness to his sensory devices allowed him to quite literally predict every single movement made by Jacobs. His sensing of initial electrical activation within the very cells of Jacobs’ body allowed him to see into the ‘future’.
Perhaps Jacobs would have similarly accurate predictions of Xeight’s body if Jacobs had as detailed data from as many neuro sensory ports. He did not.
Xeight had pulled out two pistols, one in each hand, and began firing. Jacobs, too, was dual-wielding pistols.
Meanwhile, the eight spider arms of the two blocked the wave of bullets by relying on trajectory predictions, formed from the data received from the sensory devices activated within the space exosuits.
The surrounding engineers rapidly stepped back and a few that happened to have been given exosuit stood in front to ward off any stray projectiles with their own spider arms.
The difference between the two soon showed. A bullet slipped past Jacobs’ spider arms and struck his space helmet. The glass-like material cracked slightly, but it would take many bullets to pierce the visor.
Xeight was relentless. Eight mini-lasers detached from the back of the exosuit and began zapping heat beams at Jacobs. He was already being conservative-- after all, his upper limit was twenty-one total motor devices.
Jacobs responded, but he only managed to activate six. Combined with the eight spider arms, that meant Jacobs had fourteen motor devices and fourteen sensory devices, amounting up to a total of twenty-eight neuro channels.
The martian finally realized he was outmatched.
“You must be Bone!” Xeight’s reputation of not desiring combat had spread to the martian military. It was also estimated by the martians that Bone supposedly could control just over thirty total devices-- the current eight arms and eight lasers classified as motor devices aligned with that information.
Xeight did not respond. He accelerated his rate of firing frantically, giving off the image of a panicked man.
“Xeight!” Jen warned over the noise of firearms and laser beams.
Xeight did not heed Jen’s concern. His advantage with the laser beams allowed him to melt a few of Jacobs’ spider arms a glowing red.
Finally, Jacobs’ spider arms’ movement grew erratic with the damage sustained. On the other hand, Xeight’s own spider arms, though warm, very much retained their function as he successfully alternated between the many different arms to balance the heat that came from Jacobs’ lasers.
“Xeight! Stop!” Jen had an inkling of what was about to occur.
Xeight ignored her plea and continued firing with his dual pistols despite Jacobs’ defenses already having been shattered.
A barrage of bullets struck Jacobs visor one after another.
The martian was in disbelief. “You--” His visor shattered and a number of bullets pierced his forehead in a rhythmic row.
Jacobs’ body crumbled backwards and his eight damaged spider arms opened wide spaceward as the six hovering laser devices dropped dead with a clanging percussion against the metal ground.
“Xeight…?” Jen murmured, petrified that Xeight was capable of such… savagery.
She gazed at sight, only to be stupefied by Xeight curled in a ball on the ground, seemingly trembling in fear.
No… The Xeight that she knew would not act in such a manner. This had to be… some kind of masquerade, she reasoned. Her Xeight would never recklessly commit such an act of malice!
It was then that Ensign Khan managed to finally catch up to the now-deceased Lieutenant Jacobs. She was much too late. She grimaced at the sight of the man’s holed forehead and bloody helmet.
The martian soldiers that accompanied Khan instantly drew their pistols and pointed it in every direction.
“Who did it?” Khan’s voice trembled with both anger but also consternation.
Everyone’s eyes glanced at Xeight who was curled up in a shaking ball.
“We… we will take him into our custody.”
“No.” The engineer who had been held hostage by Jacobs stood tall before Khan.
“What? A member of your colony has committed murder! This--”
“Your man threatened us first. Fired on us first. This hangar is under twenty-four seven surveillance. Is this the true face of Mars?!”
All the engineers and those that had been drawn by the alteration suddenly found courage despite the barrels pointed at them and stood between Khan and the curled-up Xeight.
Khan was now full of trepidation. Based on her minimal interaction with Jacobs, she already had a vague idea of what might have happened.
This was a disaster in all aspects.
“Send us the surveillance data.” She pursed her lip. “Take a stretcher and transport… Jacobs out.” A number of soldiers initially hesitated but quickly moved when Khan demanded, “Now!!”
Two soldiers stayed completely stationary with their pistols still raised.
“You are just an Ensign and we are under Vice-admiral Laurent. If we have to forcibly--”
“Take them!” Khan finally understood why her mentor, Zheng, had so many disagreements with Vice-admiral Laurent.
The other soldiers obeyed her. She might be just an Ensign, but every single soldier under Vice-admiral Zheng understood her position was quite unique in some sense.
Her soldiers had raised their barrels onto the two Laurent soldiers that were unwilling to leave.
It was then that these two soldiers understood that the rumors regarding Zheng and Laurent were not just surface level disagreements, but deep-rooted even within the soldiers of their forces.
These two immediately dropped their weapons and Ensign Khan led the group away, and at the very least, temporarily resolved the crisis.
“Ensign Khan.” A rather mellow-voiced middle-aged soldier questioned, “Are you certain that was the right choice?”
Some in Khan’s position might perceive such questioning to be an attack on one’s judgment. Not Khan. It was not as if she hadn’t been ridiculed by morons before. But, when she ‘zoomed out’ and examined all the times she had been questioned by her compatriots, more often than not, it was simply because some sincerely wished to understand the reasons for her choice.
Granted, she had the chance to observe up close her own Vice-admiral Zheng butting heads against Vice-admiral Laurent at every single meeting. And she knew those incidents were no friendly banter. At the very least, her temperament developed under such influence.
Anyhow, Khan knew of this soldier. He was Mendes, a steadfast man that had a reputation of remaining stoic in the most harrowing situations.
“Lieutenant Mendes.” Khan replied with zero hesitation. “If we had acted, we would have completely alienated the whole belt. They know of the T3ST colony. If what they say is true, that surveillance data, if released, would reflect poorly on us. Our independence charge would collapse overnight. Unless you wish to completely erase the whole of T3ST colony.”
“Even then,” she added, “there are members that are only half-members of the T3ST colony. Neurorevo sent a few engineers to assist them as well. They too, can easily leak the surveillance data. Even If we were to abandon our morals and erase them to cover up the altercation, if neurorevo discovers our actions… our backdoor supply of weapons will vanish overnight as well.”
“We very nearly lost the war in that space of a few seconds.”
Mendes and the other soldiers were reminded once again of why Vice-admiral Zheng valued Khan. But, there were certain things Khan could not do. Dealing with those two soldiers and their crew from the Laurent faction within the military, for example.
Khan had a feeling that the single B-class Laurent starship crew would cause endless trouble under the current circumstances. Vice-admiral Zheng had described Vice-admiral Laurent’s faction’s line-of-thinking to be similar if not wholly that of a subjugated group-siege mentality.
Her neuro circlet made a beeping noise, and Khan realized that she had just been sent the surveillance data of the incident. Khan hurried her feet and extended her strides. She needed to notify Vice-admiral Zheng of the incident immediately. This was something that had to be communicated face-to-face and discussed by those of a higher station.