The First Nova I See Tonight by Jason Kilgore (best ereader for pdf and epub TXT) 📗

The room went pitch black except for Yiorgos's blue-glowing saber blade, which swiped downward at the droid as Yiorgos jumped from the tube onto its back, stabbing down into the body of it. Sparks flew as the plasma cut into the titanium alloy, silhouetting the whipping of the droid's remaining arms.

Dirken didn't know where to aim, and he didn't want to hit Yiorgos. But then he heard a slap and the sound of something heavy hitting a wall and a grunt that could only be his partner, away from the metallic sounds of the droid. So he aimed and fired a double tap at the sound of the bot. The two plasma bolts hit their target on a leg and in the head.

The droid stumbled, then half-dragged itself toward Dirken.

Dirken backed into a wall, then fired twice more. The first missed widely. The second found its mark.

There was an initial burst from the bolt, then the droid stopped moving as some inner power unit detonated in a bright green flash, catching fire and burning with green and blue flame. Two of its eyes were still glowing faintly, but it didn't move. The room quickly filled with an acrid smoke, activating the fire suppression system, but only a sprinkling of the foamy suppressant flew out of the sprinklers, having no doubt been used up elsewhere. Blobs of the white foam splattered over Dirken and everything else in the room. It didn't do anything to put out the fire.

Still aiming his blaster toward the bot, Dirken quickly stepped across the debris to Yiorgos. The cyborg was sitting up, his back against a wall, his human hand rubbing the top of his head

"You okay?" Dirken asked.

"Yeah. But I think it dented my skullcap."

Dirken helped him to his feet. "Let's get back into the tubes." He found his pack, which had been dropped at some point, and slipped it back over his shoulder.

"Wait a moment," Yiorgos said. He deactivated his saber, turning it back into a hand, and stepped over to the droid.

"Careful."

Yiorgos knelt next to the eyes of the droid, examining it in the flickering green light of the flames, then opened a small hatch under the "chin" of the bot.

"What are you doing?" Dirken asked. He walked over and picked up the safebox. Hopefully, whatever was inside was still intact.

"Getting the control frequency." The cyborg extended an access cord from his arm and tried to plug it into a port in the hatch. "Ugh. Old tech. Old UW military tech, no less." He fiddled with the access cord for a moment, attaching something to the end, then tried again, this time successfully plugging in. Yiorgos tilted his head and gave a couple quick blinks, then said, "I'm in."

"Your hacking ability never ceases to amaze me."

"I'm no AVA."

"Ava?"

"A.V.A. An ancient hacking A.I. that nearly started an interplanetary war after hacking into every major computer system on Earth a thousand years ago." He waved his hand as if shooing a fly. "Never mind. Long story."

An explosion rang through the ship, and Dirken felt the floor shudder. "How long is this going to take?"

"Patience." Telltale tics of Yiorgos's head indicated a download in action. Dirken heard shouting and more shots fired from somewhere just outside the room.

"Okay, got it," Yiorgos said, and extracted the cord as Dirken holstered his blaster and positioned himself under the tube opening on the other side of the room.

"How's that supposed to help us?" Dirken asked, cupping his hands to give Yiorgos a boost up.

The cyborg sighed as if it was supposed to be obvious. "You said there's a boarding party coming, right?"

"Right." Dirken boosted Yiorgos up to the tube, and his partner then pulled himself up and offered his cyborg hand down toward Dirken. Dirken passed the safebox up to him, grunting as he lifted it over his head.

"Well, they don't want the hunter droids attacking their own crew, right? Or other droids." Yiorgos continued. "They must have transponders on them that match the control frequency of the droid and keep them from attacking. We can mimic that frequency."

Dirken grabbed Yiorgos's hand and was pulled roughly up to the tube. He slapped Yiorgos on the back. "You're a genius. Can you activate it to protect us?"

They turned and continued on all fours with the safebox through the tube toward the back of the ship. "Well," Yiorgos said. "I can protect myself. You don't have a transponder built into your chest, I assume. But if you stick close to me, it's probably just as good." He glanced at Dirken as a wry smile on his lips. "Probably."

They continued in silence for many long minutes, passing through two different tube junctions. One had been sealed off to a branch, likely due to another depressurized cabin, but Dirken didn't figure that was the way they needed. At the second junction they heard the pulsing reverberation of heavy rifle fire below them, ending suddenly with a scream that sent a shiver up his spine. The access tubes filled with a white smoke and the smell of burning plastic, so both of them reached to their belts, unclipped the oxygen masks they'd grabbed at the entrance, and slipped them over their faces. The hiss of oxygen was a welcome relief. Dirken hadn't bothered to check that the mini-cannister was actually full.

From the direction they were heading, they heard a heavy grinding and motor sound echoing in some large chamber. Air rushed past them through the tube in that direction, ruffling Dirken's hair and whistling around the bend until they heard the grinding motor sound again. He guessed they were hearing the hangar doors opening and closing, and the rush of air was from the return of atmosphere to the hangar bay.

"I think the boarding party has entered the hangar," Dirken said. "We must be very close now."

And indeed, within a couple minutes they came to an end to the tube where a vent grating and open iris met a ladder down to