Chapter 135 The Kinetic Kill

Chapter 135 The Kinetic Kill
Commander Valerius had upon the screen behind him one which would have been a billboard, and which was showing the end of the world.

The Command Hub was dominated by a digital map of the Earth. The red crosshairs were focusing on the surface--on the ruins of the Spire, the Wolf lands in the north, the rest of the man-made habitations in the east.

The station AI said: " PROJECT CLEAN SLATE: INITIATED. KINETIC ROD DEPLOYment T-MINUS 180 SECONDS.

Look at them, Valerius said, and his voice was full of surround-sound speakers. He made no movement with his lips; the cables that were connected in his skull did not touch his vocal chords at all. "Tungsten rods. Twenty feet long. Expelled out of geostationary orbit. These will carry the impact of a tactical nuke, but without the fallout. Pure, cleansing impact."

You are not cleaning anything! Ryker screamed, and lifted his pulse rifle. You are killing people that survived your first error!

I am correcting the data set, Valerius answered. "Evolution has stalled. I am simply... shaking the jar."

He twitched a finger.

The Command Hub was a spherical room having no floor but a walkway suspended on which he was floating towards the central interface where Valerius was suspended. The gravity plating in the walkway was turned off as he twitched.

"Vane! Mag-boots!" Ryker yelled.

We hit our heels together. CLACK. The soles came onto the metal grating of the walkway and were glued to it by power of magnets before we just lost our gravity. We were almost so upright on the face of what was meant as the floor, that we stared up--or sideways--at Valerius.

"Turrets," Valerius commanded.

It opened panelled walls of a sphere. Thousands of automated defence turrets came up, green laser sights in pursuit.

"Cover!" Baron roared.

He couldn't take cover. He was a massive target. He charged; he was doing the one and the only thing a Wolf Alpha can do.

Baron shot out of the walkway, flying through the zero-G into the closest turret. He moved like a torpedo. He crashed into the gun and tore off the barrel with his claws and kicked off the wall to the next one.

"Vane! Get to the console!" Ryker gave the word, and shot measured volleys at the turrets pouring the plasma on us. "Sato, cover him! Elara, distract the commander, distract him!

"Busy?" I enquired, and hid behind a floating server rack when a laser scalded the air where my head had been. He is a god in a floating chair; a cyborg! How do I keep him busy?"

"Annoy him!" Ryker screamed, throwing himself across a divan in the walkway, to pursue a squad of flying drones.

I looked at Valerius. He was timing the clock without attending to the pandemonium.

T-MINUS 120 SECONDS.

I raised my hand. The Ring was a dead man, and my relation to the wind--to the air currents--was not. The Hub was pressurized.

"Hey, spaceman!" I screamed.

I thrust my hand forward. I didn't aim for him. I wanted the cooling fans over his rig.

WHOOSH.

I drew out a gale of air through the inlets. It struck Valerius a sudden downdraft and he lost his suspension field. He was revolving on his head, the ropes straining his head.

Variable detected, I hissed, Valerius righted himself with another thought. "Irritating."

The cables on his back struck out. Not data lines, but prehensible. With razor-sharp tips of data, they attacked me like cobras.

Ryker intercepted.

He took a step, firing the micro-thrusters in his stolen Purist armor. He flew to and fro between me and the cables, swearing his Star-Metal sword.

SHING.

The sword cut three out of the cables. Sparks showered the room.

Scratch," grumbled Valerius, shivering. Damage of the peripheral nervous system.

"Disconnect!" Ryker howled, and took one of the cut-off cables and pulled Valerius to himself. "Or I cut the brain stem!"

Nothing you can do about the physics, Valerius sneered.

He gestured.

The gravity changed in the room. Not off. Sideways.

"Whoa!" Vane yelled.

And we were hurled to the left side as down all at once turned into the wall. Vane dropped twenty feet, and hit a display screen by losing his hold on the console.

"Vane!" Sato screamed, and slid down the wall behind him.

"I'm okay!" Hanging on a conduit Vane groaned. But I can never hack when I am falling!

T-MINUS 90 SECONDS.

He is playing with us, said Ryker, magnetizing his legs to the wall. "He controls the environment. We must take the control off.

Ryker stared at the main interface- the Throne in which Valerius was a computer connection.

"Baron!" Ryker shouted into the comms. "The throne! Smash the generator!"

Baron, who was now hanging on to the ceiling (which was it now the floor?) gave a howl of recognition. He shrank his limbs, and jumped at the foot of the suspension-rig of Valerius.

Valerius saw him coming.

"Denied," Valerius stated.

A force field came into existence around the throne. Baron hit it face-first.

CRACK.

The impact was sickening. Baron hit the shield, passing out, floating aimlessly in the zero-G at the center of the room.

"Baron!" I screamed.

"Focus, Elara!" Ryker took me by the arm, and rooted me to the wall. Vane must have a straight line to the firing sequence. I'm going to drop that shield. When I do... thou must bear Valerius.

"Hold him?"

"Use the wind," Ryker said. "Pin him to the chair. Don't let him counter-attack."

"What are you going to do?"

Ryker glanced at the Gravity Hammer that was tied to the back of Vane - now floating close to the console.

I am going to smash it with a hammer.

Ryker pushed off. He flew toward Vane.

"Give me the heavy!" Ryker yelled.

Vane dropped the huge weapon and threw it. Ryker caught it mid-air.

He didn't land. The pulse rifle by recoiling threw him forward in a straight line towards Valerius.

"Valerius!" Ryker roared.

Valerius turned. You are an animal, Ryker, a primitive one. You use sticks and stones in fighting.

This is a big stone all right, Ryker grated.

He turned on the Gravity Hammer. The engine in the rear of the head flared white-hot.

Ryker swung.

He hit the force field.

BOOM.

When the wave of graviton hit the energy shield it caused a shockwave and broke all the screens on the wall. Glass fell slowly down in slow motion.

The shield flickered. It overloaded. It failed.

"NOW!" There was a scream of Ryker as he fell back with the recoil.

I reached out. I didn't think about magic. I thought about pressure. I imagined the crushing mass of the sea, climate of Jupiter.

CRUSH.

I threw the air down on Valerius.

He gasped. The cables squeaked, as they were straining their utmost. He was fastened to his chair, and could not gesture, could not move the gravity.

"Vane! The sequence!" Ryker shouted.

Vane scrambled up to the console and Sato supported him.

T-MINUS 10 SECONDS.

"It's encrypted!" Vane swore and his fingers flew on the holographic keys. "Biometric lock! It must have a Purist retinal scan!

"We don't have a Purist!" Sato cried.

Ryker looked at Valerius.

The Commando was crippled, wrestling in my wind.

"We have him," Ryker said.

Ryker kicked off the wall. He flew toward Valerius.

"Get away!" At last Valerius broke out into a shriek. "You are unclean!"

Ryker caught Valerius by the throat.

When Ryker commanded to look at the camera, she obeyed.

Instead, he pulled the face of Valerius to the retinal scanner on the armrest of the command chair.

T-MINUS 5 SECONDS.

Valerius closed his eyes.

"Open them!" Ryker ordered.

He stuck his thumb in one of the pressure points in the neck of Valerius.

With a horrible gasp Valerius rose with eyes open.

Ryker forced his face into the scanner light that was red.

SCANNING...

T-MINUS 2 SECONDS.

IDENTITY SATisfied: COMMANDER VALERIUS.

ABORT SEQUENCE?

"YES!" Vane broke the manual override switch.

SEQUENCE ABORTED.

The green lights in the room were turned red.

The crosshairs above the earth disappeared on the gigantic screen. Kinetic rods, which were suspended in their tubes miles above us, were pulled into place.

There we floated in the silence of the zero-gravity room.

And when I said it was over, I relieved the pressure of the wind.

Valerius dropped in his chair. He looked small. Defeated.

Doomed... the species, you have doomed, Valerius wheezed. Everything...
Ryker was floating in his direction with the Gravity Hammer in his hand.

The Rot is a problem, Ryker admitted. "But we'll solve it our way."

He raised the hammer.

And we do not need you spying on our back.

"Wait," Valerius gasped. Kill me... the station goes... off. The orbit decays. You will burn with me."

Ryker paused.

"Is that true?" he asked Vane.

Vane checked the console. "He's bluffing. The station is autonomous. But... he does have a dead-man switch that is connected to his heartbeat. In case of his demise, the station is locked down. We'd be trapped in here."

Ryker lowered the hammer.

"Fine," Ryker said. "We won't kill you."

Behind the head of Valerius he reached. He snatched the interface cables that were inserted into his head.

"But you're resigned."

Ryker ripped the cables out.

SH-CHUNK.

Valerius screamed--thin and high. The ports in his neck spurred out sparks. His eyes shut up, and the blue light died out of them. He jerked, fell asleep in the chair, and only a man in a white suit.

Sato checked his vitals on a distant scan, and realized that he was in a coma. His brain is fried, but his heart was beating. The station stays online."

Ryker repelled the floating body of Valerius in disgust.

"Vane," Ryker said. "You have the chair."

Vane flew up to the command seat. He sat down. He stared at the huge monitors of the planet in Earth, the grid of orbits, the armaments.

"I'm the Captain now?" Vane smiled, but his hands were trembling.

You, you, are the Traffic Controller, said Ryker. "Lock the weapons. Open the hangars. We must get on to the surface.

"Back?" I inquired and sailed to Ryker. "We just saved the world. We have a space station. Why go back?"

Ryker glanced at the screen--at the grey stain of the Rot that was covering the continents.

Why not up here, you see, Elara, and the war isn't? said Ryker. "It's down there. We stopped the execution. Now we must save the patient.

He examined Baron who was groaning and waking up.

In addition to that, Ryker grinned, a weary, wolfish one. "Baron hates zero-G. Thou hast stayed here, and he will feed on the furniture.