A Series of Futuristic Sci-Fi Novels
Worldburner by Johan M. Dahlgren
Series Excerpt
Inside the bunker, it's cool and dry and there's not a soul in sight. This is going way too easily. Did they see us climb and are waiting for us around the corner? It shouldn't be this simple to infiltrate a maximum-security bunker full of religious zealots. The Church of Christ the Redeemer is notoriously hard-assed and they have been responsible for more religious murders than any other cult on the planet. On a world as notorious for extremist violence as this, that is something.
When I saw the redeemer banner in the video, I knew what was in store for its main character, and he probably knew it too. I can't even begin to imagine what went through his mind in the hours before he unwillingly starred in his very own snuff movie. Nothing cheerful, I bet.
I really hope I will get to kick some redeemer ass this time. Previously they have shown the uncommon sense to stay the hell away from Gray Industries and thus kept themselves out of my jurisdiction and from the lack of a welcoming committee I'd say they are still avoiding me. Too fucking bad. Ever since Samarkand I've wanted a shot at paying the bastards back.
I haven't got the foggiest idea what their special branch of Christianity is about, and for all I know they could be having a full scale Roman orgy on the altar right now. I was prepared for something like that. The one thing I didn't expect them to do was go to bed and leave the corridors empty. From what we managed to gather before going in, this bunker is home to at least two hundred and fifty people, some of them women and children. It should be full of life. People eating, drinking, fucking. Something is seriously wrong with this place and it's starting to give me the creeps.
I motion for Wagner to move down the corridor and check another door. He moves very fast for a big man, Wagner does, and he doesn't make much noise. The Norse sure know how to breed 'em. He sidles up to the closed door while I cover him with my PDW.
The handle disappears in his big hand. On my command he tests it and finds it unlocked. I signal for him to go ahead and he throws the door open. He pokes his head in and gives me the all clear. It's empty.
I step up to the door, the Aitchenkai PDW held ready against my shoulder and pointed slightly downward as I scan the room. The space really is empty. It looks like some sort of storage facility for foodstuff, which seems logical since we just left the kitchen. I let the door fall closed again. All the doors in a limpet bunker are designed to fall closed of their own accord. Gas and fire are the only two things the inhabitants of a limpet bunker have to worry about. A nuke or a ram-strike is not something you really need to think about, since you will never notice when it hits.
We move down the corridor, checking doors and finding them all locked. More storage space, from the looks of it. That's probably where they keep all the good stuff reserved for the high priest and his cronies. From the smell, I'd say something is going stale somewhere. On the floor are a few abandoned toy cars. It looks like these people left in a hurry.
As we near the end of the corridor, I hear a faint whirring sound. Something is moving up ahead. It doesn't sound like a cultist, but you never know. It could be a slavering fanatic in an electric wheelchair. We're not taking any chances.
I motion for Wagner to stay back as I slide along the wall, slowly inching closer to the T-junction. As I approach the intersection, the sound grows louder. Something mechanical is definitely moving around the corner. I slowly pull back the slide on my PDW and check there is a round in the chamber. Like an old lady making sure she has turned off the stove before going to bed. I never do that. This creepy place must be getting to me.
I get down on my knees, trying to make as little noise as I can. A guard posted to look out for approaching enemies unconsciously looks for people at head-height. It's basic human psychology. If there is a guard there and I peer around the corner at ground level, I should have the precious tenths of a second I need to pull my head back in time to avoid a bullet in the face.
It's a great plan in theory. The only flaw in my reasoning is that robot-sentries don't give a shit about human psychology. The ceiling-mounted, twin-barrel machine-gun turret spots me, swivels in my direction, and opens fire in less time than it takes to blink. When the bullets come flying I am already pulling back, decades of training giving me an edge, but I'm not nearly
fast enough. I feel my face exploding into pain as concrete shrapnel tears into my forehead before I'm safe behind the wall again. Mesmerized, I watch the corner disintegrate in slow motion under the storm of bullets. The opposite wall explodes into flying concrete and ricocheting metal as I fall on my ass and use my legs and elbows to scramble backwards to safety. Blood gushes down my face but I feel the adrenaline pumping into my bloodstream, shielding me from shock. I need to use the short respite before the pain comes crashing in to do something creative about that turret.
"Wagner," I shout and reach back.
"Coming up," the giant replies and I feel a heavy fragmentation-grenade slapped into my palm. It's a testament to the many years we've spent together that he knows my every move as soon as I know them myself. I pull the pin with my teeth and throw it into the junction. I hear the bullets from the sentry track the bouncing grenade and hope they don't deflect it. Then I cover my ears with my hands, curl up into a ball, and open my mouth in preparation for the detonation. In a confined space like this the shock wave will be as lethal as the shrapnel and if you're not ready for it, the pressure will rupture your inner organs.
One moment there is just the noise from the guns on the sentry, the next the explosion is the brightest light I've ever seen, the loudest noise I've ever heard, and the hardest fall I've ever had, rolled into one. The corridor fills with concrete dust, cordite and black smoke, boiling around us. I lower my hands and even through the ringing in my ears I can hear the gunfire has stopped. Pieces of concrete fall from the ceiling like calcified rain.
Got you, you bastard.
There is blood in my eyes and I can hardly see, but the pain is held at bay by the chemical cocktail pumped into my bloodstream by my brain. A marvellous machine, the human body. I collapse against the wall.
"A little help here, big guy," I call, probably way too loudly since my ears are still ringing from the explosion. I fumble the first-aid kit from the leg pocket on my combat trousers with one hand while I try to wipe the blood from my face with the other. My mouth is full of the taste of blood and I hawk and spit on the floor. The concrete is red and wet beneath me as is my t-shirt, and I probably look like hell. The upside is, I feel pretty good. It must have been a glancing hit. A cracked eyebrow will bleed like crazy, but once you get the bleeding stopped you realise you're not going to die. Wagner helps me bind the wound with gauze from the med-pack and I wipe the crusting blood from my face.
Wagner turns my head this way and that. "Close shave," he says with the first hint of concern I've heard from him since I woke up in the rain last night. He can hold a grudge for ever, and I've seen for myself the results of ending up on his blacklist. I'm grateful that he's at least talking to me again.
"I've had worse. Have you got a mirror, big guy? Am I still pretty?"
"No time, Cinderella."
I smile despite the pain and the blood. True that. Then a troubling thought bubbles up from my subconscious.
"Why the hell do they have an active robot sentry outside the bloody kitchens?" I turn to Wagner. "There are kids in this place. Something is seriously fucked up here."
"Whatever you say, boss." Maybe he's not entirely over that episode at the bar after all, but I can see his brain is processing the implications, and I take a moment to enjoy the miracle. Goliaths are not noted for their abundance of brain power, and Wagner is as thick as they come, but even he understands that you don't activate an automated sentry outside your kitchen door unless something has gone severely sideways.
It couldn't be our doing. If they had spotted us climbing in it would have been simpler to just have a sniper shoot us off the cliff. There's no need to arm the wartime defences just for us. Nope, something has happened here, and I have a feeling that whatever happened is the answer to the mystery of the missing zealots. Whatever it is, I hope it's long gone.
"On your feet soldier," I punch Wagner on the shoulder and get to my feet. Damn, I feel pretty good. I guess there's some truth to the old saying that only after courting death can we truly appreciate life.
I crouch and pick up the dusty PDW from where I dropped it and brush it off. Then I grab a handful of debris from the ground and toss it into the junction.
Nothing.
I wave the barrel of my gun around the corner. Still nothing. I take a deep breath and peer around the corner and there is the sentry. It hangs from the ceiling like a dead metal octopus. A red light glows like a baleful eye in the middle of the twisted metal, indicating it's still online. I can't help a cold shiver of satisfaction knowing the machine is aware of me when I step out into the corridor. It knows I'm there, and there's not a damn thing it can do about it. Fuck you, Mr Machine Intelligence. Maybe you will not inherit the earth after all.
As we move past the thing Wagner does the sign against evil when he thinks I'm not looking. The Norse have never been at ease around AIs, even low-level ones like this. I read the explanation somewhere, but I can't remember it now. It was probably very psychological and full of archetypes, racial guilt and repression and stuff.
We move down the down the corridor and the smell of something rotting grows stronger until it finally overrides the acrid smell of cordite. Perhaps someone's pet has starved to death in the absence of Redeemers to feed it? I try to tell myself that. It's not working very well.
Keeping a keen lookout for more sentries, we reach a huge chamber with a big double door marked by a wooden cross. Want to give me more than even money that's their church, and that's where everybody is hiding? No? No one?
"Wagner, crack it," I order as I cover the hallway. Wagner brings out his break-in kit and plugs it into the access hatch. He may not be the smartest man around, but he has some mean skills when it comes to picking locks and killing people.
He's got a connection up and running in no time.
"That's strange." Wagner looks puzzled. I risk a quick glance at the readout of his console. Strange indeed. And a major pain in the ass.
It looks like the door was locked from the outside using an override code, meaning there's no way we're getting through. They might as well have welded it shut. Whoever used that override didn't want anyone getting in there. Adding to the mystery, the log says the door was opened only twenty minutes prior to that, using the same override. So, someone broke in, did something, and locked up again after they were done. The question is who, and why? Did they steal something? Or did they leave something behind? And do we really want to look inside?
"OK, we're not getting through here. Come on." I nod down the corridor. "We'll have to find another way in."
We move on down the passage and that's when we start finding them.
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