Cyborg Assault

Marten glanced back at Omi. Omi shrugged. Marten studied the dot. It seemed brighter than before, making his gut twist. More cyborgs—he had no idea how to defeat them this time.

Osadar spoke again. “I do not know how, Marten Kluge. But I know that whatever the cyborgs have decided to do, it will be to destroy the Highborn. A sense of fear will compel them.”

“Can computers fear?”

“They are not computers, but symbiotic creatures of flesh and machine. Beings of any kind are always more dangerous when they fear their enemy, for then they fight with the ruthlessness of terror.”

Fear bit into Marten as the bloom of starry brightness began to turn into a spaceship. How could he defeat the cyborgs a second time? He had no idea.

-4-

The ship was a small asteroid or a large meteor. To Marten, staring out of the pod’s window, it seemed as if someone had magnetized the inter-solar rock. Then that someone had brushed it over a planetary junkyard. Pipes, tanks, tubes, missile-clusters, engine-exhausts, globes and other assorted junk stuck to it. He suspected that the life-supporting chambers were buried in the center of the meteor. Instead of adding particle shields to a regular ship, the builders had started with a tiny asteroid and added to it.

Using his handscanner, he studied the ship’s dimensions. It was smaller than the Rousseau had been.

“A Thales-class vessel,” Osadar said. “They were being phased out before the war with Social Unity thirteen years ago. The near total annihilation of the Jovian expeditionary fleet returned them to favor.”

“That makes it a military vessel.”

“And therefore the probability is ninety percent that it is under cyborg control,” Osadar said.

Marten bit his lip as his gut curled. They had nothing to fight with but two Gauss needlers. He hated the helpless feeling. He should have recharged the portable plasma cannon.

“I’m picking up something on my headphones,” Omi said. “They’re asking if anyone is alive.”

“Do not answer,” Osadar said.

“Should we just sit here and die until our vacc-suits give out?” Marten asked. “Answer them.”

“You will regret it,” Osadar said.

Marten fiddled with his helmet radio, hearing nothing but static. The EMP blast from the Mayflower had damaged it. He was unable to pick up anything from the ship outside. It was hard enough understanding Omi and Osadar.

“They’ve acknowledged,” said Omi.

In seeming despair, Osadar bent forward and rested her helmeted forehead on the control panel.

“We’ll kill the first ones,” Marten told her.

Osadar said nothing.

Marten watched the meteor-ship. A piece of the junkyard fired jets, detaching itself from the small asteroid. It was a black globe, probably the same size as their original pod.

Here we go again.

As Marten watched the globe ease toward them, a headache spiked a point between his eyes. Did cyborgs control the Thales-class warship? Or were Jovians allied with cyborgs? None of this made any sense.

* * *

Forty-six harrowing minutes later, Marten set his Gauss needler at high velocity. Then he waited with a tripping heart as the red flare of a slowly moving laser-torch cut open their tomb. Omi stood beside him, with his own needler out.

Marten clunked his helmet against Omi’s as he chinned off his radio. They would speak through the metal of their helmets. “If it looks like they’re going to capture us…” Marten said.

“Yeah,” Omi said, his voice sounding tinny and faraway, “in the heart.”

“In the heart,” Marten agreed.

The laser-torch cut its last section of bulkhead. Someone with a clamp on the other side removed the section. The being poked its head in, and stopped short.

Marten’s tongue felt raspy and his heart hammered as he knelt to the side. He aimed his needler at the enemy faceplate. He liked that his hand was steady and that his voice didn’t crack.

“The last people were cyborgs,” he said over the radio. “So let’s get a look at you, friend, before I riddle you with needles.”

For a moment, nothing happened.

Goodbye, my friend, Marten thought, on the verge of bellowing with rage and shooting Omi.

Then the staring visor went from black to clear. A pale, frightened man regarded him. The man had a round face, a small nose and a small mouth.

Marten’s stomach relaxed a fraction, and he eased pressure from the trigger. “Are cyborgs on your ship?”

The man blinked rapidly almost as if trying to comprehend the question. Finally, he asked in a strange, clipped accent, “Cyborgs? Do you mean like the creatures they’ve been broadcasting about from Mars?”

“That’s right,” Marten said, trying to determine if the man was faking ignorance.

“What’s wrong?” a woman asked over the crackling radio-link. “Is anyone hurt in there? If they are, we need to get them out fast.”

A vacc-suited hand pushed the pale, blinking man deeper into the chamber. Then another helmet poked in. That person stopped suddenly.

“You have a weapon,” she said.

“We’re nervous,” Marten said. His needler pointed rock-steady at her faceplate. “I’d like to see your features, if you don’t mind.”

“What does that have to do with—”

“Just do it,” the pale-faced man pleaded, clutching her suited arm.

The woman hesitated and then her visor became clear. It showed a pretty female with small features and a round head.

“We ran into cyborgs earlier,” Marten explained.

Her features changed into something like a person facing a crazed killer high on stimulants.

“Cyborgs… yes, I understand,” she said, pasting on a tremulous smile. “We don’t have any aboard the Descartes. Please, put away your weapon. And-and you can come with us.”

Her look did it for Marten—that talk of cyborgs was crazy.

“It-it would be better if… if you gave me your weapon,” she said.

Marten holstered the needler and shook his head.

“Ship protocol—”

“Will have to take a back seat today,” he said, patting his holster.

She nodded quickly, and said, “If you’ll follow me then. And just to let you know… the Force-Leader will want to know how you managed to become trapped in one of the Rousseau’s pods. I do not wish to insult you, but you don’t seem like a Jovian guardian.”

“I’m not. I’m Marten Kluge. My friends and I just arrived from Mars.”

-5-