WATER TOWERS IN THE BLACK
31 Oct 2021Goldgunner1
This was truly a s****y assignment. The "rain" that sheeted down on the team was generated by the cooling towers that rose above them like massive industrial cathedrals. They made sure that the beta level power station below them and the settlement buried even further below ground could keep a stable temperature and recover the coolant it used to stay thermally stable. It was still s***t to be drenched. The benign source didn't lessen the discomfort and the reduction in visibility would have spooked a lesser team. He was pretty sure that the Admiral had set this one up and even though he was right there with the team, he was also sure that Bomanian Admiral was secretly taking pleasure in the "training opportunities" that this mission provided. They were close the five of them. They'd been fighting together for months and whether it had been shipboard or on the ground they formed a cohesive and dangerous whole that was far less forgiving than the sum of its parts. Prime had point. He was the youngest and the newest to the team and had eyes like a sewer rat. Eyes for opportunity, plunder and those ideal moments to put the knife in. Only part of that sentence was literary device and the rest was bare truth since Prime had a thing for knives. If it could be personal, Prime made it personal. It was endearing. Prime was armed with a plasma shotgun engineered for range and stopping power.
Ricza and his necklace of bloody tryllium squares followed hot on Prime's heels and he was flanked by Henzler. Both of them had their TK Aphelions primed and sweeping for targets. Not the hardest hitting weapons and with a low kinetic profile, so largely useless at keeping enemies off the team, they did strip a personal force field in seconds and allowed Prime to belt them with the shotgun unopposed by any field energies. The shotgun penetrated like nobody's business and if it hit you unshielded you were going to shed bloody tears. The Admiral followed and he stalked through the sheeting water like it wasn't there. His visor, combat suit and weapons upgraded more than anyone in the team. His individual excellence and his right to leadership evident in the composition of his gear. He had his AR 50 unlimbered and his extra magazine capacity made him especially dangerous to anyone whose force shield was down. Bringing up the rear and taking the usual ribbing for it was Goldgunner. His Aphelion sweeping the dark corners of the base and his plasma pistol, safety off holstered against his thigh.
Outside this facility the planetary surface was dark and grumpy. Covered in random fumaroles and hard edged crevasses. Mineral clusters and rich veins of mineable material winked in and out of vehicle mounted lights. The pickings were rich for miners and travellers who were not risk averse. These particular minerals were mined and then turned into heatsink ammunition and rail gun slugs. Nothing ruined your day more than a kilogram of metal accelerated to a fraction of the speed of light. They were in demand and sold for a pretty penny around local space and beyond. A key part of an illegal weapons operation.
"Roll on the day they are available as handhelds" thought Goldgunner to himself as he stalked at the back.
Inside, the soft light of the blue moons of the planet punched through the distant circular openings of the towers and the sheeting cooling water tinkled as it hit the ground or fell between stack layers. The moons were the only light and the water was cold if it touched your skin. The dominator suits were constantly updating their HUD's and the filters compensated for all the temperature differentials in the towers. This power station was vital for the deep and multi-layered settlement that lay below the surface of the planet. Tidally locked, the darkness didn't end and the key issues for a settlement this large were power and food supply. Water was easily available on this rock and the geysers also provided a degree of geothermal power. They were, in general though, unpredictable; and, were more likely to destroy generation related machinery. This power station was using a series of buried thermopiles to effectively generate electricity and the usual power regulator to prevent surges and manage the flow of power to the various parts of the base that needed it. That included an extensive underground hydroponics operation. Stable power and so long as no one messed with the power regulator or the machinery associated with the distribution of power all would be well.
The team stalked through the darkened halls of the engineering facility and covered every possible firing arc as they went. Not burdened by the absence of a heavy weapon since together and coordinated they were a walking collection of the same. Ricza was fond of spouting some old-terran bulls***t about "rather being a Rambo than a Florence Nightingale". Apparently on checking Gal-Net long term archives this turned out to be a mantra about being a deadly killer rather than a charity worker. A deadly killer he was so there was no argument from anyone on the team.
"Split" came the curt command from the Admiral.
Prime was their cowboy pilot. The red Mamba with the go-faster stripes attested to that. He and Henzler split to the left and cut off down a side corridor. Henzler, despite that mag-clipped lead weight that he liked to throw around had a reputation for writing code that big business didn't like and that several police forces found interesting. He could hack and slice the codified constructs that managed bases and built AI's in minutes, less if they were production line programmes. Ricza, Goldgunner and The Admiral were heading straight to the core of the powerplant, leaving wet footprints behind and the faint sense of ozone as the Aphelions charged and cycled through their battery management protocols.
Henzler and Prime were heading for the launch bays and the cargo chambers of this settlement and the others to the nerve centres that kept it alive. The team had been dispatched to this location by a lucrative faction contract but they would have come anyway because this settlement was under the brutal rule of the Black Fingernail and it was all personal.
A slight dimming of the odd wall globe-glow indicated some sort of base level response.
Henzler cut in, "Boys, I am in, Jackal Disruption Programmes are running and the cargo is being transferred".
Prime followed, "I am on board and powering up, nobody is the wiser. Whatever H is doing is working bro".
That put the team on the clock. The rest of the team picked up their pace. Movement ahead and two patrolling security guards turned a corner ahead of the three strong strike team. There was no hesitation. The Aphelions flared and lines of light ripped into their shields and overloaded them, only the whine of full recharge broke the disciplined silence. The Admiral finished them both with two silenced balls of blazing hot plasma. One had his face chewed to the base of his skull and the other had a sucking hole through his chest armour that you could have put your fist into. No noise and quick dispatch. They were followed by three workers, one of whom had the clearance chip that the team needed to penetrate to the heart of the operation. We stopped to clone it and Ricza used the moment to break out those black anodised pliers and add to his collection. The soggy ripping noise was lost in the sound of the falling water.
With the cloned access ID chip and the likelihood of discovery growing, the team drove ahead quickly. Through the rooms and bays that housed SRV's, fighters and close order defence Scorpions shooting every worker we found and eliminating any security personnel with prejudice. The team stopped when quick criminal record scans were possible and when we did out came those pliers again. He'd need a second chain soon. We powered open the last door and were met with protest and pistol shot. Neither were a deterrant and the plasma pistols wiped out all the engineers and staff in the facility. No mercy. Simply no mercy since this f*****g facility and its rulers were totally unconcerned about the misery that they sowed in the sector. If you worked for them, I guess there was a chance that you were indentured in some way, but probably you were a scab. In all likelihood, guilty and some collateral s**t was impossible to avoid in these sorts of operations. Stripping any valuable from cupboards and working efficiently to support the Admiral the team killed external sensors, external authorisations and all the settlement defences. That chip gave us all the access we needed. Goldgunner tossed the chip overhand to the Admiral and he caught it, swiped it through the powerplant access port and pocketed it in one move. He rapidly typed the entry codes and the soft klaxon indicated the power shutdown routines were commencing. The Admiral moved to the door and so did Ricza, switching to their Aphelions and the AR 50's underslung for quick access. They knew the drill. Shut the power and every single Black Fingernail scumbag would be hurrying here to fix the problem. In our case, fix it permanently.
Meanwhile, Goldgunner had crossed the engineering floor to the spares chute and carousel. You know the one. All spares for this part of the base came up through this carousel where access for engineers was easy and emergency shutdowns could be handled with minimum hassle and without any sort of significant downtime. He typed the request and used a lower level ID to authorise it and the slaved screen blinked in and out and the machine belt began to move. Seconds later, from deep in the base, a spare part for the suit charging duct appeared in the slot. Goldgunner removed it, overrode the terminal and relayed the information that it had supplied the wrong part. Just as the belt began to move with the intent of correcting the supply fault, Goldgunner substituted the part with a shaped thermal incendiary charge.
"Gift on its way Admrial" he intoned.
"Affirmative" came the reply from the Admiral.
"Cargo T-2 mins to loaded" interjected Henzler.
"Jackal holding them steady Type 27 is warmed and ready to cook off" informed Prime.
"Power shutdown in T-4 minutes" was the automatic response from the overhead Tannoy. That's when the fight started.
Gunfire flashed and rattled as security tried to break in. Not security, f*****g bandits, bullies and thugs. Goldgunner fired overwatch from above the stairs and his shots with the Aphelion stripped their shields. Then the Admiral cut them down mercilessly, stitching chests and faces and where necessary legs and knees with 50cal dum dum rounds. Tearing the Black Fingernail goons down as they made their approaches. The fight was interrupted by the dull boom of the charge going off.
That's their spares fragged commander" flat-voiced Goldgunner.
"Ten, nine, eight" began the countdown. Ricza switched to his plasma pistol and headshot the worker who was trying to peek around the corner into the power office.
"Lets get it done" said Ricza as the power regulator hissed, smoking hot from its containment chamber and the force fields that held it in bio-physiological balance.
Goldgunner seized it and racked it in his new magclip containment cylinder and switched to his AR 50. No more burning his f*****g hands. The team broke through the door and headed out towards those self same towers. The towers where the water fell into the dark. They made quick time. Gunning down the Black Fingernail as they went, judging their allegiance based on who was shooting at them and who was cowering or had their hands up. They weren't totally without feelings.
They made it to the towers and once again walked in the cascading water and the moonlight. their footsteps, direction of travel and personal comms masked by the age old secret services trick of falling water. The number of challenges decreasing as the Black Fingernail diverted resources to manage the imminent power crisis and by the utter darkness shed abroad without the power plant to light up the place.
"Type 27 away, anti-air silent, cargo safe and sound Admiral", came the unusually terse report back from Prime.
Seconds later they all emerged on the pad. Tired but the mission a success.
The Bomanian Admiral, Physionater, removed his helmet as the laser trackers on the Bone White Black Swan washed over them. The Frag defenders going off line and the multi cannons cycling up to punch the card of any interlopers. He turned and smiled. It wasn't characteristic of him during the mission but now his smile lit up the pad.
"Well done all" he said, "the Fingernails will choke to death underground or freeze aboveground".
"We've stolen their regulator and blown their spares to hell" he observed dryly, "and the slaves are safely on the Type 27 and will be freed on station shortly".
Goldgunner turned to the Black Swan and smiled. F**k the Fingernail he thought as he strode away from the falling water, the icy moonlight and the unforgiving black.