A Dungbeetle's Dream 3

Humanity throughout the ages has had some major setbacks. The burning down of the Library in Alexandria, the dark ages, the abrupt and mysterious end of the Bronze age. All of these required humanity to pick itself back up and relearn hard lessons. Painful eras of disease and destruction inflicted on the generations that were unlucky enough to come after these abrupt halts to progress. Even now in these days some two hundred or more years since the 21st century, humanity was once again needing to relearn secrets and technologies long since forgotten. Though humanity was still inexorably bound to technologies, some technologies had been, for lack of better phrasing; misplaced. Databases of top secret information, or even patents were left behind in the Sorrowful escape of the planet Earth. Misplaced is the better term than forgotten, or lost, because all it takes is the right person in the right place doing something illegal and suddenly a terrifying application of obscure technologies suddenly appears on the horizon.

The large black spacecraft racing across the solar system was that terrifying application of technologies. The black coat on the outside of the ships was not just a scare tactic, or a sad attempt to hide in the darkness of the universe. Unfortunately for the defenders and defense systems of the Stepping Stone station, it was in fact stealth composites. Not the basic or early iterations that were seen at the end of the 20th century. This composite was almost perfect at hiding even the relatively large dreadnoughts of the Hildas incursion force.

This small fleet was lethal for its size, if not for the stealth, the station might have stood a chance. It was as if David had used an obsidian stone to slay Goliath while he took a walk on a moonless night. Black on black, and as smooth as oil pouring over oil, the fleet made contact with their target.

DEFENDERS

The CEO, Ford Tannen, who had been wounded both physically and egotistically had found his power again. With a fresh bandage on his neck, the blood on his white shirt like a badge of honor, he marched to the command center of the station. This was to be a brief stop to reassert his authority before beginning his hunt for revenge. He initiated his emergency contact list for violent situations, this was done by squeezing his hand into a first for three seconds, followed by violently throwing his hand to the side forcing his thumb, index and ring finger into extended but not separated positions. Immediately he was connected to the leaders of several security teams across the station.

"Hunter team, I want you prepped with tracking devices on a fast gunship ready to leave in 5 minutes. We are going after that wench of a Haruspex... The rest of you, ready everyone you can. I want you lethal in 45 min. This station is ours, and I'll be damned if some girl thinks she can snap her fingers and take this place from us... You have your orders." He cut the broadcast by slashing his fingers again.

A hatred burned inside him; visions of the horrible things he would do to Vidya flashed across the stage of his mind. It all fueled him, but like a man feeling the sting of a slap in the face by someone perceived as weaker or lesser, this power was mostly hubris. A rage of ego, quick to ignite and seek retribution, revenge, validation or all of the above.

The station began to come alive. Hurried footsteps could be heard, men that were under his command began to become rush. This control over so many lives made him feel like he was high on drugs, it made him drunk with an insatiable desire. He found himself in the command-and-control room, so he made an announcement,

"I want a map of the trajectory of any ship that leaves our station. We don't know which craft she took but we will soon enough. Once you've calculated them, send them to me and my Hunter team." He made eye contact with all of the workers there; they didn't say a word. He turned and made his way to his quarters. Once there he changed into a light armored space suit, convincing himself that he looked like a warlord. In reality he was too large for the armor, and it made him uncomfortable. Grabbing his helmet, he then made his way towards the hangar where he would meet with one of his captains. He settled on bringing 50 men with him in a larger gunship, and they would follow the Hunting team to their target. By this time the Cacoethes and Antihalian had departed. His security teams had about 20 more min to prepare.

This act of pitiful rage and desperation had actually been an accidental blessing for the station. For when the timer clicked to one hour after their departure, across the station there were dozens of platoons already for combat. Dressed in armor, donning helmets, and loading rifles... Like lethal killer bees preparing to leave the nest after being disturbed, they were all working themselves in a fit of rage. Men who had never seen combat itched at the chance to prove themselves. The leaders of these men had been hand chosen by Tannen for their brutality and violence, and they reveled in the chance to act out the violence that they craved in their hearts.

Then stations warning system began to blare, and in some area a rumbling and crashing could be heard. There was a new disturbance at the hive, unfortunately, it was a honey badger's claws that was breaking into the hive.

ATTACKERS

Leader of Alpha team, Iso, struggled to control his breathing. Once they had launched inside the coffin sized craft towards his target, there was nothing left to do but wait. Despite being a veteran of many conflicts, he still felt the adrenaline course through his body as they silently flew towards their target. He knew that his pod was nigh invisible to sensors, but the skeptic in him made him paranoid. Paranoid that THIS station unlike anyone else they had encountered really could see them. A brief vision of defensive canons simply targeting them and destroying them with one shot each danced across his mind briefly. He pushed these thoughts down and winked through the map displaying the trajectory of the 50 men that were part of the first wave. If everything was going according to plan, the timing of their launch, the rotation of the station and the openings to the hangars, would be perfect. They had to maintain radio silence, and the pods only had a small guidance computer to get them to their target.

Iso chuckled at the dark thought that maybe he was the only one still flying and everyone else was already dead. Maybe undetected space debris had floated in their path, or maybe the oxygen tanks for some mixed improperly and now the pods really were coffins. Only time would tell if everything would work out. The gentle filling of the pod with a kinetic gel told Iso that within seconds, time would give him an answer. All hangar doors had a thin energy veil that was good enough to maintain air pressure, but not strong enough to be considered an energy shield. Slamming into the hangar, the pod ground to a halt, and then finally popped open. Iso snapped to attention with a gun drawn ready to fight, but no fight came. Iso looked and saw leader of Bravo team, Poly, meet his gaze from his pod. They were stuck in the gel from the waist down but only for a moment longer. The kinetic gel began to dissolve in a hot mess around them, and in seconds they were free of their vehicles. Warning lights were bright, indicating to the stations crew that an 'unplanned entry' had occurred.

Quickly each of them stripped their pods of additional ammunition and made sure their rifles with inherent suppressors were set to fire semiautomatically. The ammo for their rifles was a precious commodity, and ideally, they weren't going to doing too much shooting. Poly grabbed a set of tubes that were no bigger than his arm and magnetically strapped it to his back. Each tube had a small, guided rocket with high explosives. They weren't meant for anything heavily armored, but they could prove useful. They moved to the entrance, getting to either side of the door, just as it slid open to reveal an old engineer coming in to make any necessary repairs and identify the object that had come in unexpectedly. He froze and raised his hands, seeing a gun in his face. Using no lethal force, they subdued him and removed his communication device. Not everyone had neural implants, especially not lowly station engineers.

Just as they moved to silence the alarms, the code and siren changed to an intruder alert. Somebody managed to see them and raise an alarm. Movement from behind them revealed a small gunship dive past the hangar doors firing it's forward cannon at their destroyer. They had to move quickly. Racing into the halls, they found themselves at a central junction. Moments later all 48 other men arrived, some from a level above, others from a level below. They began dividing themselves into ten-man teams, as Iso broke radio silence.

"Team Alpha, we hold here. Team Charlie, descend to the market and secure it. Teams Bravo, Dog, and Echo ascend to the command center. Move fast and watch your fire for non-combatants. GO!" They moved in silence and with practiced coordination.

Outside the station silent dark space craft began to materialize within close proximity of the massive station. The larger space vessels slipped from the darkness and began a coordinated effort to eliminate each of the cannons across the exterior of the station. The strike was surgical using heavy cables with magnetic weighted ends, this pulled all the turrets to point into harmless directions away from the incursion force. The force wanted to cause as little damage as possible, everything was expensive, and it all came out of their percentage. Of the 50 initial invaders, 48 had managed to capture their port of entry without an issue. If all 50 had slipped in unnoticed, the station would have fallen within an hour. Unfortunately, the wounded pride of one CEO had set the stage for things to go sideways.

DEFENDERS

The Hunting team was led by a silent man named Martillo. A man who had a rough life that took him from Luna out to Jupiter and many places in between. Martillo had been abducted at a young age by a raiding party who had attacked a hospital on the moon of Earth. The raiders were a man and woman who were looking to steal medications and supplies that had become scarce throughout the system. The man and woman also had known a interested buyer of children, so when the opportunity had arisen, they snatched him up on the way out. But when the child trafficker was killed before they could make the sale, they decided to put him to work. Teaching him to clean weapons, fly the small craft the three of them lived on, and the star charts. When Martillo was 8 years old, he was rescued from his captors in a violent altercation with a search and rescue team. For the next ten years he lived on the Search and Rescue craft, learning the craft, learning basic medicine, learning even more intricate layers to the many places people could find themselves.

At 18 years old, Martillo literally had 15 years real world experience, most of it in navigation and piloting. Leaving the crew of the Search and Rescue craft, he had found himself at Stepping Stone station looking for work. He signed up with the security forces on the station, thinking it would be a good fit. He climbed the ranks quickly with his experience and work ethic, finding himself now working for the Debt Collectors. He was to repossess any craft that was past due on its payments, or take payment. After a few years working for the Debt Collectors, he was known as a man who always found his mark. Ford Tannen, had recruited him as a his right hand man, putting him in charge of the Hunters. Martillo hand selected two other men to work with him, both no nonsense men of action. The first was Leo, who had been a Lieutenant in the security forces. The second was a man named Rob, who was just as well rounded as Martillo, but at least twice his age. Rob was a bounty hunter proper who had happened to be in the right place at the right time and found himself working for Martillo.

The three men always had their light gunship stocked and ready to leave at a moments notice. When the got the word they were to search after the Haruspex, Leo and Rob were already on the ship. Martillo had delayed their departure only to gather as much intel on the crafts they would be looking for and what they could be up against. When they had received the trajectory predictions and charts from Tannen, they were strapped in and disembarking. That's when a pair of pods rocketed into their hangar. On their gunships display they cycled through the exterior cameras to look at what had just barely missed them. It was Rob that recognized what they were and alerted Martillo.

"Those pods are carrying a lethal incursion force. Call Tannen." Rob said it with such authority that Martillo didn't hesitate.

"Tannen- were are being attacked. Alert the station that the hangars have been breached." Martillo saw on his camera feed that the pods had popped open revealing two soldiers with rifles. Leo patched the live feed to Tannen. The soldiers in black armor, carrying black armor, from inside black pods, were in stark contrast to the rest of the hangar. One moved his rifle as if to fire at their gunship. Martillo pulled the release handle and throttled their craft out of the hangar. Their space craft had better weapons, but it's armor was the bare minimum, too much risk when they were about to go into deep space.

As they flew through the energy veil, they saw in front of them open space, but it began to move in an unnatural way. Martillo pushed the nose of their craft down and accelerated out of instinct. This motion happened suddenly, and on the controls of the craft he accidentally pressed the fire controls on the small cannon that launched a preloaded tracking devices. Leo was in control of the forward gun, a spherical pod of the cockpit, the targeting computer and screens provided a 360 by 360 degree view of the exterior of the ship. Seeing Martillo fire was all the permission he needed to engage. The forward 25mm cannon roared and began pinging off the armor of the large dark destroyer that was now directly in front of them.

The tracking devices immediately began broadcasting the location of the destroyer back to command on the station. Which informed everyone that not only were there an unknown number of soldiers now in the hangar, but there was a destroyer class vessel now within close proximity of the station. Panic and fear settled across the entire command crew. These emotions were then amplified when they found the Defensive cannon were unresponsive. A tempest of orders and responses were carried out by different teams. Drone pilots were dispatched to discover why the cannons were unresponsive, as well as to assist in target identification. Combat pilots on the other side of the station raced to their gunships to intercept the destroyer. And missiles guided by the tracking device were fired, even in long trajectories, in an attempt to overwhelm the invaders.

Inside the station the security teams that had all been marching to hangars to assist in the hunt, now were being diverted to choke points and junctions that would slow down the incursion force. In an attempt to make these point more difficult to take by force, they had automated turrets, movable armor walls, ammunition and some had first aid stations. But they were responding to a threat, rather than preparing for one. Captain of the guard Tally Wilsher knew this fact and was racing for a central junction with 40 men, hoping he wasn't too late. His first lieutenant Myka Anderson was holding the command center with 25 soldiers, and his second lieutenant Dan Ribeiro was moving to hold the lifts in between the command center and the hangars with another 15 soldiers.

ATTACKERS

Iso watched his teams disperse from the junction that they were holding. The lifts at the center of the station experienced the least gravitational forces from the rotation of the station. Using emergency access shafts in the same area, the teams were able to ascend or descend to their targets just by pushing themselves in the direction they needed to go. Teams Charlie, Bravo, Dog and Echo were gone moments after getting their orders.

This key junction from a bird's eye view looked like a crosshair. The station was circular, making the floors curved in either direction as you walked. Gravity made the center of the station towards your head as you walked. Alpha team took positions in the low gravity area and attempted to harden the four possible access points. The plan was to have two-man teams at each crosshair entry, and two men in the middle responding to which ever point needed the most help. Magnetic boots would help anchor the men in whatever way they thought best, making each isle a unique problem. But it was at that moment of attempting to float deployable cover that they made first contact with the security forces. Bullets rained down from two points, making any further adjustments to the deployable cover impossible. Iso and his second in command were the two support soldiers, they split up and gave suppressing fire out at the security teams attempting to come in. One of Iso's men was bleeding, his wound began leaking into the air, but down away from them several security soldiers could be seen dead pinned to the 'floor' with gravity. Then to make matters worse two lifts opened in the center revealing more security forces. Loud gunfire erupted from all directions and chaos took control of the entire firefight.

_________________________________________________

Outside the station the battle raged in silence. No thunderous fiery explosions with each missile shot down, or drone disabled. A raucous could be heard inside the ship and inside the station, but if one was just observing from a distance, all that could be seen was brief flashes, tracer rounds, and debris. A violent clash of greed and conquest would normally herald a calamitous climax of destruction and the grinding of machinery. The lack of any noise would be enough to make you think you had gone deaf. But in space, all the heroic bravery, the mechanized firepower, and the epic struggle between opposing forces was nothing more than silent drifting struggle of life and death.

The bridge of the destroyer class vessel was a din of computer warnings, verbal orders, and efforts to coordinate defense. The roar of cannons and banging of metal on metal rang throughout the ship. Damage to the exterior began to add up, areas of the ship began closing sections of airlock doors to prevent complete decompression. Electrical fires broke out causing even more alarms to suddenly ring out. A small fleet of drones flooded the targeting computers, gunships began attack runs, and missiles flew towards them. The defensive counter measures were stretched to their limits. Every shot had to be accounted for, because they did not want to destroy the station. Small, controlled bursts rang out from many different angles of the ship. This destroyer had just been unlucky, for the other nine ships putting themselves into strategic positions hadn't been seen yet. So, it fell to this single ship to distract the stations defenses for as long as possible. They soon found their ammunition running low within minutes of their initial engagement, not because a lack of preparation but because of the intensity of their fight.

The commander of this vessel, Commander Cree, gave the order for the onboard targeting computer to take over all defenses. He then gave the order for everyone to abandon ship. The crew scrambled to make it to a gunship or cargo vessel or escape pod, in a silent confusion of how quickly they had been forced to flee. In a hurry he patched himself into the communication system across the ship,

"We fought well- it was a short fight, but we gave it our all. This wouldn't have happened if we had to pull our punches! Follow me off this ship in any way possible. We live to fight another day!" Cree cut his broadcast and made his way to a small lifeboat.

As the hull of the destroyer began to break, escape pods and lifeboats quickly blasted away in all directions.

DEFENDERS

In the command center, the biggest problem they faced was the lack of support by the automated turrets. These turrets were designed to be active around the clock, and for some reason about half were not responding. What made matters worse was that the unresponsive turrets were facing the destroyer class vessel that was now the center of attention. Repair crews were dispatched, accompanied by drones designed to help breakdown derelict vessels, or repair mechanical issues. One crew had been out repairing a simple radio antennae when the defecation had hit the oscillation.

Soren was a simple man, but he was good at all things mechanical. He kept to himself, keeping company mostly with a his humanoid looking robot: Repo. Repo was a custom robot with parts from a SABRE drone, a welding station, and a exoskeleton used to move heavy objects. Soren had spent most of his extra money and time upgrading Repo to the state he was in now. Repo had a basic programmed personality meant to attempt at human responsiveness, but more importantly he was programmed to protect and save Soren if anything happened while they were outside the station.

Just as Soren had finished testing the functionality of the radio, he had turned and saw what looked like a long metallic bola fly and wrap itself around the end of one of the OICs. Then he saw three more get wrapped by the same ball and wire looking mechanism. Soren felt a pit in his stomach sink and make him sick, he knew it wasn't a coincidence, this was an attack.

"Repo get to cover!" He shouted beginning to move as fast as he could to the opposite side of the station. Soren had two sources of oxygen, the first was a long hose that was a literal life line. This life line was called the Umbilical, but in case of emergency, Soren always had a tank of oxygen that gave him another 30 min of oxygen. He had a second larger tank built into Repo that would give him several hours as another line of protection. Though Soren was a towering two meters tall and 110 kilos, he wasn't a fighter. Repo grabbed Soren and using the magnets in his hands, feet, and knee joints, swiftly moved them just far enough to observe, but out of the direct line of fire.

They both turned and watched pods fly into the hangars perfectly. Soren cursed under his breath and felt fear attempt to freeze him where he crouched. Then he realized he should broadcast a camera feed back to command and control. Pulling up his small interface on his wrist he fumbled for a few minutes attempting to find the button that would connect him to his boss in the command center. A robotic voice broke the silence,

"I have been broadcasting the last 10 seconds from my feed Soren. Look." Repo pointed back towards the hangars which just over the hill that was the rounded portion of the station. Just as Soren looked up a gunship flew out of a hangar. Ducking out of instinct, Soren watched as a black wall seemed to materialize forcing the gunship into an invasive maneuver. He saw some flashes as the gunship fired at the newly materialized ship.

Soren threw himself flat on his back breathing heavy. Repo crouched lower and moved to cover Soren. A video message appeared in the heads up display of Soren's helmet.

"We need crews to figure out why the OIC cannons are off line. All crews respond immediately." It was from the Station Chief, Soren couldn't help but notice the chaos that was in the background of the message. Soren began to try and steel himself for what was to come next. Taking three quick breaths in and out he looked at Repo.

"Repo we have to try and help, our friends and colleagues are depending on us. Keep us out of sight, they're going to fire at us the moment they see us." A green light appeared on the 'face' of Repo. As he moved in and stood over Soren, magnetically binding to the rig on his back, and began to crawl like a spider towards the nearest cannon. Repo was made of a tough alloy and would provide some cover to Soren but he wasn't invulnerable. The made it to the cannon quickly, watching other gunships enter into the fight. Reaching the OIC they broadcasted images of the magnetic bola wrapped around the barrel. A drone flew over their head and began to confirm their findings only to be quickly shredded to pieces by a short burst from the destroyer. Soren and Repo crouched low and got as close to the cannon as possible. Repo detached and moved to start cutting through the thick cable that was keeping their stations defenses out of the fight.

Soren inched his way forward and looked at the ball end of the bola, noticing a box that could contain circuitry or a control panel... or a detonator. The last idea made Soren shudder, but his hands seemed to have a mind of their own. A tungsten multitool he was able to unscrew a panel without any magnetic interference. Looking inside he saw simple circuitry and no evidence of an explosive device. He took a deep breath and reached in ripping out all of the wires he could find with his eyes closed.

No explosion came, but the electromagnet powered down allowing Repo to yank on the wire with his exoskeleton arms. The bola popped off and Repo pulled the wire in around his mid section. The action confused Soren much that he shouted, "Repo what are you doing?!"

Repo got low to the deck and moved to pick up Soren. Once Soren was once again connected to Repo and moving to the far side of the station is when Repo responded,

"I am following your directive to salvage anything that might be valuable." Soren made a mental note to make a subroutine for emergency or combat scenarios so basic directives could be ignored. Behind them the cannon began to spin up, firing at the destroyer in quick lethal succession. It was all that was needed to turn the tide of this battle. Up until this point the single ship had handled all the other defenses and counter measures that had been launched. Soren sat in awe of the capabilities of this one ship, it had in close quarters fought several gunships, dozens of drones, and missiles. All of which was done with minimal damage to the station.

Decompression and buckling of portions of the ship suddenly began appearing all across the length of the fuselage. Life boats and escape pods launched in all directions. The destroyer now just a husk lazily floated away from the station. An audio broadcast was transmitted into Soren's helmet, an uproar of joy and praise boomed through the speakers, "Enemy Destroyer is destroyed!"

Inside the Station, Captain Wilsher and his men let out a ferocious roar and pushed the attack on the central junction. The success of the stations defenses outside lit a fire of victory in every one of his men. It was as if their accuracy increased suddenly, and the confidence couldn't be higher. The invaders suffered some five casualties within seconds of the broadcast, as if the defender's success stole any confidence that might have given them the advantage. Captain Wilsher could taste victory.