Ace Dreamer
07-30-2012, 12:08 AM
Consolidated Failure - 26/Jul/2012
December 2011, Asteroid Belt.
All alone in the dark. Arthur waited. The faint hiss of the air system. The smell of summer days, that the bus always had. And, the acrid smell of burnt-out electronics.
They'd used some sort of EMP weapon. Easy enough if you had access to enough power. Short-range though, and there'd been nothing on the radar. A disguised space rock? The bus depended on a lot of hard tech, and that had fried. They'd even killed the co-pilot, the Alice Phone - didn't look as though that was as hardened as they hoped.
*Knock* *Knock* *Knock* Better go and let them in. They'd just do more damage, otherwise.
---
The leader was a woman, done up in a mixture of pirate and high tech. The three followers were more mixed, but, thought Arthur, shouldn't be underestimated. The leader's eye-patch was probably authentic, given the nasty scaring around it. No! It wasn't an eye patch, it was an 'eye drive'.
"I am the Dread Pirate Roberta!" Seemed a bit over-done, thought Arthur. "So, you are going to kill me?" "Tell me why I should make an exception!"
"I'm an industrialist by the name of 'Arthur'. If you're smart you can get a good ransom for me. Dead, I'm not worth anything like as much."
She grinned. Arthur noted that she'd carefully blacked-out some of her teeth. Obviously a cos-player. The thugs were standing around, still fully-suited up, likely ready for nasty surprises. There was a faint glimmer about one of them, that Arthur guessed as a force field. Looking again at the woman, she was wearing a 'Wright Suit' - 'Interesting', thought Arthur, 'Rich pirate'.
"Take off that suit. I know it's a spacesuit in disguise." Remarkably well-informed pirates, thought Arthur, as he undressed. The woman watching with interest, as you might watch a performing animal. Then smiled again, as Arthur stool there in vest and underpants.
"Nice." And she gestured. The man with the glow did something to an armlet, and energy fizzed and crackled around Arthur.
"Much better", said the woman, looking at Janet in her underclothes, with a broken, smoking, belt, falling to the deck. "You made two mistakes. One, I know what to look for to spot a holo disguise. Two, we've already got an 'Arthur'." 'Bingo!', thought Janet.
"You can take your helmets off, now, boys." The woman gestured widely. "Take a look around, and see how big a fish we've caught." Janet counted, as they obeyed, and one man kept watching her, with more than casual interest. The man with the glow had dead eyes, but while he looked at infinity, he seemed to move around OK, and the third went up the stairs to the upper deck.
"Becca?", called the one from above, "I think you need to come look at this." "It's 'Roberta'! How many times do I have to tell you!" And, finally, none of them was looking directly at Janet.
Leaping to one side Janet slammed down a hidden switch. The gravity shut-down, and all the air rushed out of the lower deck of the bus, through the suddenly open emergency door. 'Now they're fighting against the environment, not just me', she thought.
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the man who'd been watching her fumble his helmet, then start to panic. 'One down.' Everything was in slow motion, as she reached out, knocked the top off a container, and let vacuum spray the contents all over the leader's helmet. Which went opaque. The emergency force-field should keep the air on the upper deck, and the man who went up there.
The way the man with opaque eyes was moving implied he was thinking as fast as her. Yes, he was surprised, but he'd almost instantly recovered. However, he was obviously used to moving around in gravity. And, Janet had trained for this.
'Gravity Punch!', though she'd thought it, rather than shouting it, and, anyway, vacuum. Bouncing twice she plowed into the man, backed by all the power of her speed drive. Used like this it would burn-out in minutes. He slammed backwards into the stairway, which he'd stepped towards, then she kicked him in the neck, where his re-donned helmet joined the suit.
As she kicked she felt a tingle, and that foot went numb. EMP? She'd check later. Another flip and she was stripping weapons and tools off the leader, who at least seemed to have some idea about moving in zero G. One of her tasers in the right spot in the 'Wright Suit' fixed her.
The third thug had stood at the bottom of the stairway, watching the action. He'd been smart enough to put his helmet back on, even though he was in atmosphere. His head moved, obviously assessing the situation, as she flew slowly towards him, dressed only in her underwear, one fist raised, and glowing. Carefully he unlatched his helmet, and put his hands in the air.
After two minutes of vacuum Janet re-pressurised, to a fifth-atmosphere with enough oxygen to keep them alive. She'd let the man on the stairway inject himself, after reading the instructions he was a lot happier, and now he was 'on ice'. The voyeur, she thought he'd be OK, also 'on ice'. Their leader, her taser had done something nasty to her cybernetics, and she hadn't regained consciousness, so Janet had to inject her.
As for Mr Dead Eyes, he seemed to have a broken neck. Janet injected him with a metabolic slow-down drug rather than the full suspended animation dose the others got, but he got the full waved duck-tape coat, only leaving his face exposed. EVA, wearing her Wright Suit as well - her 'Arthur' holo cloak was toast - led her to a van-sized space rock, which turned out to be camouflage.
Inside was a micro-base, run by an AI that claimed to have a bomb strapped to its brain. It said it hadn't reported what happened, and had caught the full transmission from the eye drive; if she removed the bomb it'd be eternally grateful. Janet had learned a lot about self-destruct mechanisms, so rolled mental dice, and gave it a go (Arthur would have done). She'd rigged a powerful wide-band transmitter to scream her location if she didn't return to the bus and re-set it, so if the AI was working on a mutual-destruction ploy that'd be bad but not totally fatal.
Someone had rigged a thermite bomb to the AI, and a clever one at that. Janet sweated, but spotted the secondary trap at the last moment. The AI then admitted it'd been 'driving' Mr Dead Eyes, but it hadn't got any choice - the leader always carried a dead-mans switch. And, seeing as the bomb hadn't gone off it presumed she was still alive. Which is why it trusted Janet. Janet doubted the logic, but wasn't going to argue.
---
That gave her a total of twenty pirates. All but one on ice. And, this last crew had done major but repairable damage (those FTL communicators were just too fragile) to the bus. Or, 'Q ship' she guessed she should call it. Finally she'd gotten some pirates she was pretty sure knew about Arthur. And, it'd be best to get Mr Dead Eyes, and the AI she'd unplugged, to some competent medical attention.
Time to head home.
--
"It is the business of the future to be dangerous" - Hawkwind
December 2011, Asteroid Belt.
All alone in the dark. Arthur waited. The faint hiss of the air system. The smell of summer days, that the bus always had. And, the acrid smell of burnt-out electronics.
They'd used some sort of EMP weapon. Easy enough if you had access to enough power. Short-range though, and there'd been nothing on the radar. A disguised space rock? The bus depended on a lot of hard tech, and that had fried. They'd even killed the co-pilot, the Alice Phone - didn't look as though that was as hardened as they hoped.
*Knock* *Knock* *Knock* Better go and let them in. They'd just do more damage, otherwise.
---
The leader was a woman, done up in a mixture of pirate and high tech. The three followers were more mixed, but, thought Arthur, shouldn't be underestimated. The leader's eye-patch was probably authentic, given the nasty scaring around it. No! It wasn't an eye patch, it was an 'eye drive'.
"I am the Dread Pirate Roberta!" Seemed a bit over-done, thought Arthur. "So, you are going to kill me?" "Tell me why I should make an exception!"
"I'm an industrialist by the name of 'Arthur'. If you're smart you can get a good ransom for me. Dead, I'm not worth anything like as much."
She grinned. Arthur noted that she'd carefully blacked-out some of her teeth. Obviously a cos-player. The thugs were standing around, still fully-suited up, likely ready for nasty surprises. There was a faint glimmer about one of them, that Arthur guessed as a force field. Looking again at the woman, she was wearing a 'Wright Suit' - 'Interesting', thought Arthur, 'Rich pirate'.
"Take off that suit. I know it's a spacesuit in disguise." Remarkably well-informed pirates, thought Arthur, as he undressed. The woman watching with interest, as you might watch a performing animal. Then smiled again, as Arthur stool there in vest and underpants.
"Nice." And she gestured. The man with the glow did something to an armlet, and energy fizzed and crackled around Arthur.
"Much better", said the woman, looking at Janet in her underclothes, with a broken, smoking, belt, falling to the deck. "You made two mistakes. One, I know what to look for to spot a holo disguise. Two, we've already got an 'Arthur'." 'Bingo!', thought Janet.
"You can take your helmets off, now, boys." The woman gestured widely. "Take a look around, and see how big a fish we've caught." Janet counted, as they obeyed, and one man kept watching her, with more than casual interest. The man with the glow had dead eyes, but while he looked at infinity, he seemed to move around OK, and the third went up the stairs to the upper deck.
"Becca?", called the one from above, "I think you need to come look at this." "It's 'Roberta'! How many times do I have to tell you!" And, finally, none of them was looking directly at Janet.
Leaping to one side Janet slammed down a hidden switch. The gravity shut-down, and all the air rushed out of the lower deck of the bus, through the suddenly open emergency door. 'Now they're fighting against the environment, not just me', she thought.
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the man who'd been watching her fumble his helmet, then start to panic. 'One down.' Everything was in slow motion, as she reached out, knocked the top off a container, and let vacuum spray the contents all over the leader's helmet. Which went opaque. The emergency force-field should keep the air on the upper deck, and the man who went up there.
The way the man with opaque eyes was moving implied he was thinking as fast as her. Yes, he was surprised, but he'd almost instantly recovered. However, he was obviously used to moving around in gravity. And, Janet had trained for this.
'Gravity Punch!', though she'd thought it, rather than shouting it, and, anyway, vacuum. Bouncing twice she plowed into the man, backed by all the power of her speed drive. Used like this it would burn-out in minutes. He slammed backwards into the stairway, which he'd stepped towards, then she kicked him in the neck, where his re-donned helmet joined the suit.
As she kicked she felt a tingle, and that foot went numb. EMP? She'd check later. Another flip and she was stripping weapons and tools off the leader, who at least seemed to have some idea about moving in zero G. One of her tasers in the right spot in the 'Wright Suit' fixed her.
The third thug had stood at the bottom of the stairway, watching the action. He'd been smart enough to put his helmet back on, even though he was in atmosphere. His head moved, obviously assessing the situation, as she flew slowly towards him, dressed only in her underwear, one fist raised, and glowing. Carefully he unlatched his helmet, and put his hands in the air.
After two minutes of vacuum Janet re-pressurised, to a fifth-atmosphere with enough oxygen to keep them alive. She'd let the man on the stairway inject himself, after reading the instructions he was a lot happier, and now he was 'on ice'. The voyeur, she thought he'd be OK, also 'on ice'. Their leader, her taser had done something nasty to her cybernetics, and she hadn't regained consciousness, so Janet had to inject her.
As for Mr Dead Eyes, he seemed to have a broken neck. Janet injected him with a metabolic slow-down drug rather than the full suspended animation dose the others got, but he got the full waved duck-tape coat, only leaving his face exposed. EVA, wearing her Wright Suit as well - her 'Arthur' holo cloak was toast - led her to a van-sized space rock, which turned out to be camouflage.
Inside was a micro-base, run by an AI that claimed to have a bomb strapped to its brain. It said it hadn't reported what happened, and had caught the full transmission from the eye drive; if she removed the bomb it'd be eternally grateful. Janet had learned a lot about self-destruct mechanisms, so rolled mental dice, and gave it a go (Arthur would have done). She'd rigged a powerful wide-band transmitter to scream her location if she didn't return to the bus and re-set it, so if the AI was working on a mutual-destruction ploy that'd be bad but not totally fatal.
Someone had rigged a thermite bomb to the AI, and a clever one at that. Janet sweated, but spotted the secondary trap at the last moment. The AI then admitted it'd been 'driving' Mr Dead Eyes, but it hadn't got any choice - the leader always carried a dead-mans switch. And, seeing as the bomb hadn't gone off it presumed she was still alive. Which is why it trusted Janet. Janet doubted the logic, but wasn't going to argue.
---
That gave her a total of twenty pirates. All but one on ice. And, this last crew had done major but repairable damage (those FTL communicators were just too fragile) to the bus. Or, 'Q ship' she guessed she should call it. Finally she'd gotten some pirates she was pretty sure knew about Arthur. And, it'd be best to get Mr Dead Eyes, and the AI she'd unplugged, to some competent medical attention.
Time to head home.
--
"It is the business of the future to be dangerous" - Hawkwind