Cyborg Assault

Marten, Yakov and others saw Octagon flee the pod and begin to tumble in space and quickly dwindle from view.

It brought a pang to Marten, as he remembered shock troopers tumbling away from the particle shields of the Bangladesh. He almost felt sorry for Octagon.

“Communications, can you raise any audio?” Yakov asked for the third time today.

The com-officer frantically worked her board. She had nimble fingers as various beeps and clicks emanated from the equipment. Finally, she glanced helplessly at Yakov.

“I still can’t understand it, sir,” she said. “Why has the Arbiter continued to maintain radio silence? And why now has he rushed out of the pod?”

“His actions seem deranged,” Yakov said quietly, as if speaking to himself.

Marten thought Yakov a splendid actor, having maintained the ruse in front of his crew for two long days.

Yakov glanced at his command staff. Something about the way he eased forward seemed to suggest an insight had occurred. “Perhaps the Arbiter received signals we’ve been unable to hear or see?”

“From where?” asked Rhea, the Primary Gunner.

Marten had attempted a conversation with her yesterday in the nourishment chamber. She had taken her concentrates and hurried away. He’d watched her leave, deciding that she moved with exquisite femininity.

“Representative Kluge,” said Yakov. “You claimed several days ago that the dreadnaught possessed cyborgs. In your estimation, would these cyborgs try to communicate with the Arbiter and force him to surrender?”

Marten blinked several times before he realized the words had been addressed to him. “Yes,” he said. “Something badly frightened your Arbiter.”

“Force-Leader, look!” Rhea shouted, pointing at the main screen.

The screen was linked to Octagon’s pod, to the cameras outside its hull. The pod had passed through the gel- cloud. Now the teleoptic sights zoomed onto the battered remains of the Rousseau. A fog of microdebris hung around the roughly spherical warship. Blue lights shined in areas. In other places, orange flares burned, subsided and then burned brighter. A discharging arc writhed in space, emanating from the engines. There might have been movement among the debris, possibly crewmembers in zero-G worksuits. There appeared among them the signature hydrogen-spray of thruster-packs.

“The dreadnaught has taken heavy damage,” someone said.

“There’s a sensor lock-on to the pod!” Rhea shouted. “It’s a weapon’s lock-on. Force-Leader, why would they want to fire at our pod?”

Bright stabs of light fired by the battered dreadnaught indicated defensive cannons.

“I have audio, Force-Leader.”

There were garbled words for two seconds. Then, on the main screen, sight of the battered dreadnaught vanished.

Once more, shocked silence ruled in the Descartes’ command center.

“They destroyed a Guardian Fleet pod,” Rhea said in disbelief. “I don’t understand it.”

Yakov rubbed the top button of his uniform, a prearranged signal for Marten.

Marten cleared his throat, and he noticed Rhea staring at him. “I’ve told you that cyborgs have invaded your system. They took control of the dreadnaught. After I learned that, I barely escaped with my life. Unless you destroy every infestation, the cyborgs will continue to grow in numbers until they overwhelm you. I know that’s what they attempted at Mars.”

“The Arbiter must have recognized the danger,” Yakov said slowly. “It’s why he fled his pod.” Yakov sat straighter. “We are duty-bound to rescue Arbiter Octagon.”

“That means nearing the Rousseau,” Rhea said. “Will they fire on us?”

“We must assume that Representative Kluge’s report is accurate,” Yakov said. “We shall therefore act accordingly.”

Rhea swept a curl from her eyes. “We can’t fire on a Guardian Fleet warship.”

“You are correct,” Yakov said. “Unfortunately for us, the Rousseau no longer belongs to the Guardian Fleet.”

Rhea turned pale. “Force-Leader, you cannot believe—”

“Rhea Merton,” Yakov said. “We belong to the Guardian Fleet. We are guardians, each one of us, selected from tens of thousands of applicants and rigorously trained to do our duty. In this horrible moment, we find ourselves without an Arbiter and without a Strategist or any official of philosopher class. We must therefore apply what reason we can to the situation.”

“I know we’re practicing a war-drill,” Rhea said. “But we can no longer continue radio silence. We must report this to Athena Station and ask for clarification.”

“You have not considered the implications of the dreadnaught’s unwarranted assault.” Yakov solemnly glanced around the chamber. “It is my duty as Force-Leader to correlate all factors and make a logical deduction. Marten Kluge and his cyborg is item under one. The Arbiter’s seemingly insane flight from a perfectly functioning pod is another item and the Rousseau’s vicious attack is the third. Something strange has occurred aboard the dreadnaught. Given our information, the logical conclusion is that cyborgs have entered our system.”

“But—” Rhea tried to say.

“The Inner Planets war has shown us cyborgs,” Yakov said. “These cyborgs are said to originate from Neptune. Neptune is closer to Jupiter than it is to Mars. I say to you therefore that we are under attack.”

Marten watched officers nod, while Rhea appeared thoughtful.

“Given the truth of my statement,” Yakov said, “we must destroy the dreadnaught and gain cyborg samples to show and warn others.”

“Go against a dreadnaught?” Rhea whispered.

“A badly damaged dreadnaught,” Yakov said. “Communications, replay the image of the Rousseau. We must discover the best means of destroying it. Weapons, begin to warm the gun and missile tubes. Engine Control….”

Yakov continued to give orders as the Descartes assumed battle status, ready to engage the cyborg-infested dreadnaught.

-16-

On Athena Station, Cyborg Gharlane settled into a full-body interface. He grew rigid as electrical currents surged through him, connecting him with other cyborgs in the room. Occasionally, one of their eyelids flickered. Liquid computers gurgled nearly, and there was a faint odor of ozone among them and a nearly imperceptible hum.

It was a mass mind-link, adding to the Jupiter Web-Mind’s computing and analysis power.

The secondary cyborgs lost the last vestiges of their identity as they merged into mind-link. As the prime cyborg, Gharlane was unique in that he retained self-awareness and could individually communicate with the Web- Mind while interfaced.

Using Athena Station’s interferometers, mass detectors, thermal scanners, and broad-spectrum electromagnetic sensors, Gharlane studied the situation between the Descartes and the dreadnaught.

Soon, Gharlane told the Web-Mind his findings.

The Jupiter Web-Mind was a marvel of technology, the most advanced artificial intelligence in the Solar System except for the Prime Web-Mind itself.

The Web-Mind’s capsule was parked in a deep hanger on Athena Station. The capsule contained a biomass computer merged with metric tons of neural processors. Hundreds of bio-forms had died to supply the Web-Mind with the needed brain mass. Each kilo of brain tissue had been personality-scrubbed and carefully rearranged on wafer-thin sheets surrounded by computing gel. Other machinery kept the core temperature at a perfect 98.7 degrees Fahrenheit. Tubes fed the tissues the needed nutrients. Sensors monitored bio-health. Sub-computers did a