Ally or Alien: A Sci-Fi Novel (22 page)

"What happened?"

"The biomorph has breached the east front. Only four turrets remain active and fire at max capacity. The life form seems to be splitting up again—I still cannot read its movement pattern. It is a mystery."

The pressure was on.

Bellrock groaned and talked to the ceiling because that seemed to be the origin of eLoom's voice.

"What are you waiting for? Get the hell out of the CoreCommand."

"Not yet. I still have 9% of my droids left. Three turrets keep firing."

"eLoom. Don't be ridiculous. Your droids are done. Same goes for this base. Let's leave while we can."

She ignored him, as always. 

"Dr. Rao is ready for transport. You can pick him up at the repair station. I will show you the way back to the hangar. Also, your hoverglider is ready for lift-off. eKazumi has calculated the route back to the port where the space elevator is. Everything is taken care of."

Bellrock pondered her words.

Sriniva Rao.

Partner from another planet.

The only reason why they still stayed at the base.

To buy him more time, making sure he could return to the ringstation in one piece. Bellrock kissed the cross chain around his neck and slipped it back underneath his exoframe armor. He stormed toward the repair station where eKazumi opened the med pod's hull and helped Sriniva out. Some kind of straps disconnected, the bionic arms retracted to the tech table's rear. The asset herself looked as impartial as ever. 

Must be sweet to be emotionally detached from turmoil, especially in dire circumstances like these. 

eKazumi noticed Bellrock the second he traversed the doorframe.

"Dr. Rao isn't fully operational, but he’s fit enough to board a glider without suffering irreparable long-term damage."

Bellrock repeated her words in his mind.

He wasn't fully operational.

Typical Newtype term. 

Sriniva wasn't a goddamn machine, but a real human being. Still, she did save his life, so he wasn’t going aggro. 

"Can you carry him?"

"Sure."

"We'll go to—“

“—the glider in the bay area, I know. Remember we Newtype are what you call telepathic."

"Right."

That B2B connection between their units seemed useful. Maybe the AC would find a way to adapt the same tech in the future, while avoiding the whole hive-mind mentality of course. 

But now, Bellrock approached his weakened buddy and said,

"We're going to get you out of here."

Dr. Rao stammered. He looked a tad better than before; somewhere between feverish and Ready To Take a Walk In The Park. At least his body was moving.

"You s-should have left without me."

"Yeah, well, you know how the saying goes."

No man left behind.

They both knew.

"Let's do this."

eKazumi carried Dr. Rao who seemed to be twice as big. But with her artificial strength, she was able to lift him up like a plastic puppet and put him down on a mobile stretcher unit.

"Off we go."

She pushed Dr. Rao's carrier and continued the path toward the hangar bay. eVax joined them out of nowhere.

"I'm coming with you."

"What about eLoom?"

"She can handle herself."

Whatever.

Bellrock readied his smartLZR directed-energy rifle and guarded the escape route from the rear. He looked around and spied for incoming aggressors. Nothing entered his vision.

Yet.

Another rumble shook up the complex. 

He said,

"This place's falling apart."

"Indeed, it is the perfect time to leave."

They ran around corners and darted into the adjacent hallway leading to the hangar bay. At least this facility was small. You had to be a moron to get lost.

Bellrock gazed upwards and said,

"eLoom, how are you shaping up?"

"I'm down to my last duo of droids. Only one turret remains active."

"Then leave. We're almost at the bay."

Her reply never arrived. 

eKazumi mind-opened the final gate to the hangar and targeted the nearest garage spot that opened its doors. The hoverglider opened its hatch and came alive with a hum.

"I am going to lay him down on the ergo backseats. Do not worry—my driving style is devoid of major vibrations. Besides, his organs have been successfully replaced. He is just weakened from the process."

"Thanks."

Bellrock looked back to the hangar entrance where they came from.

The hall seemed to be eerily quiet. 

Not a single unit remained.

"How is eLoom supposed to leave her CoreCommand?"

"Oh, she will not."

"What?"

His eyes focused on eKazumi's neutral expression. She couldn’t have been any more detached from the moment. Maybe she lacked the ability to express feelings, because her next words flushed out with no change of intonation. 

"eLoom is going to sacrifice herself for our wellbeing.”

"You're kidding."

"I am surely not."

Bellrock bit his lips.

"I thought her respawn rate was limited."

"It is, but eLoom does not seem to mind."

He shook his head. The asset's serenity infuriated him.

"Why are you standing around like a puppet instead of helping your compeer?"

"Because eLoom has ordered me to accompany you and the Exec has directed me to assist her. Besides, better her than all of us. Imagine the material waste."

These Newtype were....whatever. This wasn't the time to question their modus operandi.

Bellrock saw Dr. Rao cringing in the backseats of the hoverglider.

"Are you okay?"

He lifted his head and cracked out a faint smile.

"Feel like shit...as you would say, but hey. I'm still alive."

Bellrock smirked.

"And it's going to stay that way."

He hit the hull and told eKazumi to man the vehicle, but she was already in the front seat, controlling the vessel through her mind connection. Her head rotated toward his direction.

"Now is a good time to step inside."

Even eVax, who sat next to her, urged him to enter.

Bellrock knew.

"We can't leave eLoom alone."

eKazumi shrugged.

The captain from Earth shouted and hoped the last Newtype in the CoreCommand would hear him.

"eLoom. Get the hell out of there and leave with us."

The shout echoed into the farthest corners of the hangar hall, but no answer returned. Only the humming of the glider reverberated.

eKazumi sighed, at least that's what it sounded like.

"Oh, she does not answer anymore. Her channel is set on private."

Bellrock closed his eyes.

Damn you, eLoom.

Rao raised his head inside the glider again and coughed.

"Captain, come on. This station's done for."

Smart words.

Simple words. 

But they brushed by Bellrock as he made the most foolish decision of his career.

"Captain?" Rao said, as he saw Bellrock running away...

54

He did it.

Brain: lost.

Heart: won.

Bellrock stormed away from the hangar and ignored Dr. Rao calling his name.

Bellrock stomped.

Twap-twap.

The servo-mechanism of his HULC exoframe morphed him into an armored gorilla on steroids. 

Twap, twap, the sound of exo-enhanced boots romping on the slick floor ground. Goddamn, this has to be the most idiotic decision he has made in his entire life, and Bellrock made plenty. But after everything that happened, he just couldn't leave her alone.

He and her.

They worked together.

They helped each other.

It was an unwritten law to take those home who fought by your side, no matter the race...or material.

Besides, there must have been another glider to escape with. Newtype always had alternatives. All Bellrock needed to do was grab eLoom and take her back to the hangar.

Sounded easy, but wasn't.

All the way back in the central node point of the Farsight complex, Bellrock detected movement on his motion scanner, attached to the right arm of his exoframe. 

Red triangles flickered on the radar screen. Someone, or something, was creeping his way.

Instinct kicked in, the warrior mode switched on.

Bellrock activated the smart beam rifle. The display on its digiscope identified five targets crawling toward his direction.

Distance: 23.5 meters.  

He marched around the tables and chairs when a strange fizzz sound roared from afar.

Bellrock glanced into the corridors.

Something wicked this way.

It was time to activate the Carapace shield. The mini-droids hovered around his front and projected a curved, semi-transparent shell before his eyes. 

Zzzzooom.

His very own personal electro-magnetic shield, now fully operational. 

The battery display of his rifle showed him a good 96% charge. Pretty high count for a weapon that was supposed to be a decade out of commission. It was hopefully strong enough to deal with whatever the biomorph abomination was going to throw at him. Speaking of which, the jeepers-creepers lurked around the corridor's corner. 

What the hell was that?

A squadron of droid creatures crawled in an arrow-shaped formation. Bellrock detected a HVR Hornet hovertank chassis with legs taken from the artillery units, enhanced with various firearms. 

All merged together to take out the life forms of this station.

I.e., all humanoids. 

Not in a million millennia, Bellrock thought.

He nudged the trigger of his smart rifle with the index-finger and charged up the shot till the digital scope display encircled the incoming crawlers. When 98% accuracy was possible, the beam unleashed. A straight thunder of directed-energy that burned everything in its way. 

Invisible, like all lasers, but powerful. 

The interior design goodbye’d.

Chairs.

Tables. 

Hallway walls.

Burned away like the little mech critters that zigzagged along the curved archways of the corridors. 

An artwork of destruction. 

Pieces of the corridors dribbled down like thick cream.

The biomorph units spat heaps of smoke into the artificial air as they collapsed. Bellrock marched closer to his hotzone but kept a ten meter distance. The melted parts did something, but Bellrock had no time to figure out what they were scheming. When a second squad of them crawled around the corridor's corner, he snatched a homing disk grenade from his belt, targeted the new brood and threw the Newtype explosive. The device whistled through the air like a boomerang, floated toward the target, extracted its explosive cartridge and shattered the corridor spot with invisible waves of destruction. Pieces spattered in all directions, some bounced off his transparent personal shield like pebbles.

To keep his escape route secure, Bellrock placed the three mobile 'Needle Shepard' sentries on the strategically important corridor entrances. The box-shaped devices came 'alive' once he attached them to the ground. He pushed the button on their rear hull and watched their transformation. Twin-barrels and ammo boxes flipped open. A mini-menu appeared on their rear, waiting for orders. He chose the 'suppressive fire' option and hoped these sentries were smart enough to distinguish between friend and foe. 

Now came the running part.

Bellrock set eyes on the CoreCommand. He reached the upper level of the facility via the tube transportation and found the entrance wall to the dome. His fists hammered against the surface.

"eLoom. Let's leave this place."

Nothing but silence on her part.

She ignored him—yet again.

Come on, don’t do this to me.

The veteran from Earth wouldn't take it.

"Listen to me. The biomorph's sending its little shit-critters. This station is done for. Come with me, eLoom. We'll hit the hangar and leave this place for good."

Every sentence filled with reason and compassion—for the first time. The heart was really the one doing the hammering on the wall.

Then, finally, a reply.

"Stay out. I have got everything under control."

This woman...

"eLoom. The biomorph's inside the facility. It's over."

"So Dr. Rao is safe."

"Yes, eVax and eKazumi are taking him back to the space elevator. We should go there too.”

"Then go. Any second you wait increases your changes of dying...permanently."

eLoom, simply unbelievable.

But Bellrock was done with diplomacy. 

He deactivated the personal shield and battered the wall with his exo-fists. Ten hits later, he realized he wouldn't punch through, let alone leave bumps. Thank tech he still possessed a beam rifle. He reduced the frequency via the menu screen, lowered the distance of the laser beam to one meter and 'misused' the elongated rifle as a short-ranged laser cutter. He squeezed the trigger, burned through the hull with ease and cut out a sparkling square-shaped entrance.

What did the good old Taurus say? 

If there's no hole, rip yourself a new one.

With the beam burning through the alloy of the wall, he realized why the rifle was officially outlawed by the Newtype. This weapon created collateral of the highest order, which went against their philosophy of sustainability. Still, he was glad it belonged to him now. When the cutting process came to an end, he kicked open the new door and locked eye contact with eLoom. She still stood in the center of the control dome.

Hooked to the system, gazing at the surround screens that flared in an alarming red. All the droid unit avatars were crossed out—only the 'signal lost' text blinked.

"eLoom."

Even this close, she wouldn't listen to him, so he approached her from behind with massive steps. Grabbed her left arm and pulled her away, but eLoom resisted.

With all her might.

"Let go of me. 

"Look at me."

She didn't.

"I said look at me."

Her gentle head angled till her brazen blue eyes intersected with his.

"I am responsible for this station. I have wasted a lot of material over the last decade…because of my personal ego. I just can’t lose Farsight."