“You’re kidding, right? You just want to look at my ass.”
“You know the rules. You’ve got to be naked in the scanner.”
She glared at him, shaking her head. “I’m sure that rule was invented by a perv.”
“Just do it, Dawkins.”
“Fine! I’m stripping!”
She stripped naked while he pretended to show no interest in her athletic body. He saw the name BRODY tattooed on her hip. Dawkins stepped into the scanner bay, which was like a shower cubicle with a dozen nozzles. Anson activated the scan, spraying her with a swarm of nano-drones. Snake-like machines sniffed her, touched her and probed her orifices. From experience, Anson knew the experience was unpleasant, like being molested by an octopus. The probes examined her thoroughly. He did feel like a pervert looking at the scans of her naked body. The full scan took ten minutes. No enemy tech was found. Her DNA matched the records. Her brain scan also matched Dawkins’ last examination. Anson was relieved. He released her, handing her a bathrobe and towel. “I’m sorry you had to go through that. Get yourself a real shower, soldier. After you get some chow, I’ll debrief you.”
“You’ve already debriefed me,” she said, her eyes hard and hostile. “Listen. I didn’t come here just to be sociable. I need to get in contact with Station Delta. It’s important.”
“I don’t have a comlink right now. What’s it about, anyway?”
She sighed. “Just see if you can get them. I’ll get that shower now. That scan’s made me feel dirty.”
While Dawkins went to the female shower room in the empty barracks on Level 3, Anson returned to the command room down on Level 16. He locked the door and tried again contacting Station Delta. It was no good. The enemy were scrambling all channels, thanks to the crimson haze, which had reduced coms to line of sight. Anson wished he had a working hard line to HQ.
He replayed the recent Rippler attack, studying it from many drone recordings. It could not have penetrated the bunker with its weapons, but it could have made minced meat out of Dawkins as she waited at the hatch. One HK burst would have done it. A stationary human target was easy for a fully-armed Rippler. It was strange. Why had it not fired at her? Dark thoughts worried him. Dawkins had passed the scan – but what if she had been turned? He had not seen her for months. Anything could have been done to her. What if he had unwittingly let an enemy soldier into his bunker? He didn’t even have her under surveillance because he’d not wanted to intrude on her right to privacy. What was she doing? He called up a map of the base. “Show me humanoid signatures inside the bunker.”
Two humans appeared on the 3D map. One was in the command room. The other was in a female locker room on Level 3.
Dawkins had gone where she had said, but could he really trust her? They had gone through basic training at the same time. For a couple of months they had been together. It had been getting serious. He had even met her parents. Unfortunately, their romance broken up by the outbreak of the invasion in 2064. He had loved Dawkins, but their relationship had been the first casualty in the war, as they had been assigned to different bases on different continents.
Anson ran a complete security check and instructed the nanoforge on the bottom level to make some new drones to replace the destroyed ones. It had enough raw matter to keep the bunker in ammo for about six months. No Ripplers were going to get through his defences. Not while he was in command. He’d been on duty for sixteen hours without a break. When he saw Dawkins leaving the locker room, he decided to join her in the mess for that debrief.
Dawkins was dressed in clean fatigues, her wet hair shining like fire as she sat eating at a table. Anson grabbed a tray and a meal served by the kitchen bot. The meat on his plate tasted like steak, though it had never seen the inside of a cow. He watched Dawkins wolfing down her ‘steak’ and potatoes with a light beer. She burped and tapped her belly.
“Hell. That’s good. I haven’t eaten real food in a week.”
“Beats c-rations, huh?”
“A dead dog beats c-rations.”
“So … what happened out there?”
Dawkins’ blue eyes looked weary. “We found a Rippler factory sixty klicks over the mountains. We had orders to blow it up – after stealing the designs for making our own Ripplers. Kerry and Lambert went in covertly. They hacked the network and downloaded all the schematics for creating Ripplers onto a hard drive. All we had to do then was destroy the base to cripple their operations – but someone screwed up, setting off an alarm. We were attacked by a swarm of Ripplers. They tore my squad to pieces. Lambert died right in front of me. I got away on a hell-bike with the hard drive – but the Ripplers chased me. I only lost them by ditching my ride under a bridge. I had enough suit power to go into stealth mode until I was almost here. I ran out of juice about three klicks away. I really didn’t think I’d make it this far. I’m sorry I brought trouble to your door.”
“What happened to the hard drive?”
“I hid it in case I got captured. I didn’t want the whole mission to be a waste. It’s out in the desert, hidden. I need to get the GPS coordinates to HQ so they can pick it up. That hard drive can change the war, Anson.” She sipped her beer. “The bad news is I’m afraid we’re in major trouble. The enemy will do anything to get that hard drive. They’ll come for me with more than just one Rippler.”
“Tell me the coordinates of the hard drive.”
She shook her head. “It’s safer for you if you don’t know them. I’ll give you the coordinates when you get a signal to HQ. Could you send a drone to contact someone at HQ?”
“Too short a range,” he said. “Besides, a Rippler would take it out. They’ve been hazing my position all day. They must have suspected you’d come this way.”
“Yeah. They’ve got good intel. They probably interrogated one of my team after killing them. They have the tech to scan dead brains. The sons of bitches.” Dawkins clenched her fists. “They’re going to come for me soon. If they breach the bunker, you’ll have to do me a big favour, Anson.”
“What?”
“You’ll have to kill me.”
“You’re kidding.”
“I’m not. I’m the only person with the hard drive’s coordinates. They want it – that’s why they haven’t just blasted me with a missile. The hard drive will still be out there if they kill me. Someone on our side could eventually find it. They don’t want to take that risk. They need me to tell them where it is – so you’ve got to kill me if they get in here. Promise me you’ll do it. I can’t kill myself. Promise me, Anson.”
“You want me to promise to kill you?”
“Yes. It would have to be a head shot to prevent them trawling my mind after I’m dead. Will you do that if it comes to it?”
“If it comes to it. But it won’t. This bunker was designed to hold off a battalion. They could drop a nuke – but it wouldn’t get to us. We’re safe here as long as the drones are in operation. We can stay here until the cavalry show up.”
“News flash. HQ won’t sent in anyone into a designated hot zone. We’re on our own. Unless we can get a signal out. Can you think of a way to repair the hard line?”
“No,” he said, feeling useless. “I don’t even know how it was taken out.”
“Think of something.”
“I will. Just give me time.”
“We don’t have much time, Anson. They’ll be working out a way of busting in here right now.”
“Nothing can get through ten metres of hyper-dense crystal wall. It’s the hardest substance known.”
“They’ll find a way.”
“Listen. You look exhausted. Get some rest.”
“I can’t rest.”
“You need it. That’s an order, soldier.”