By David C. Daoust
Colin wasn’t sure what his plan was. He’d pried himself within a narrow crevice that ran the depth of the canyon. His legs held his back pressed against the opposing rock wall, as he recklessly descended lower into the canyon. He actually just let himself slide, his back and boots scraping against the rocky surface, every twenty feet or so he’d press his legs and back into the rock to slow his descent. It was probably tearing the shit out of his clothing back there, and his boots were scuffed and covered in dust, but the reckless descent could not damage him, not like a drop of such a great magnitude might. While he could survive a drop far greater than a normal man, he had to assume there was a limit to how much the Holomech itself could take within the human-shaped force field. He feared a drop high enough, would create such a concussive force, that the Holomech within would be smashed to bits, thereby destroying his form.
Once he’d descended low enough to the canyon floor, he leapt free of the crevice. The jagged rock was not welcoming, and he found it hard to navigate. Eventually, however, he reached his goal. The mine was wide and the floor was cut clean, sneaking into its depths was made so much easier than the previous slip shot half-crawl over the jagged canyon floor to reach it. He brushed some of the dust from his clothing, before he stealthily made his way down the shaft.
The mine was well made, with supports every six feet or so. A cord ran the length, every ten feet or so the wire was stripped of its covering, which allowed a pulsating dim light to illuminate the tunnel. Colin was able to stay in the darkness for the most part; the dim light was enough to guide him without obliterating the shadows.
Again, Colin wasn’t sure what his plan was. He just wanted to see. To see what these machines could be doing down here. What were they capable of? Were they still following orders? Or were their programs so advanced, that they could set up this operation on their own? Colin couldn’t know, despite the fact that these machines were his payload.
The arachnid-like Battle Drones were the illegal tech he was smuggling through the solar system before he’d blown that coil and had to make an emergency landing in the middle of the desert on this moon. Of course, he did not know that until they’d already been released on the moon, until the Drones had already destroyed the Port Town. Brought it crumbling down around him, like a… a something, he couldn’t really think up a good analogy for it, luckily he didn’t consider himself a writer; A writer would probably feel fairly foolish to be unable to finish such a sentence… But whatever, he couldn’t know what lay within his own hold until he’d linked that black lung infected scavenger together with his broken down ship.
Colin had no idea what it was packed away in his ship’s hold, but that was normal, his father liked to keep information ‘need to know’. Bernard Vice liked to keep the majority of the information to himself, only parceling information out when it fit his needs. His father decided couriers didn’t need to know what they were carrying, even when that courier was his own son. Helped to keep them from doing anything hasty if they were about to be pinched… But mostly, it left a clear trail when that information, or possibly the cargo therein, got somewhere it shouldn’t.
The tunnel opened up into a wide cavern. The cable, that lit his way, came to a junction box at the apex of the room. Three cords led from there, down three new tunnels. Colin approached the first of the tunnels, though found he was unsure which to choose, which to avoid. He listened close to each one. Two emitted a sound that put him in mind of miners working. The third, had a strange constant hum on top of a steady clanking chomp. Curiosity won the day and Colin Vice headed down the third. After a long way, he came to a sheer drop off, but below was a well lit cavern filled with activity.
A series of battle Drones were strewn within, some at various degrees of repair, others were hard at work repairing them. Colin got a pretty clear view of what was going on. The metals mined within, were being used to re-fabricate missing limbs and armor. Colin doubted they were able to repair anything truly complex… But overall it was an impressive operation.
Colin found a narrow ledge which, nimbly as cat, he leapt out to. Then stealthily ran across until he was above the farthest reach of the cavern. Here the drones constructed a much larger device. Colin could only guess… it appeared to be some form of vehicle. Much of the more complex components were being stripped from the ‘lifeless’ drones below.
He spotted another exit across from him. Rocking back, he threw himself across the room, landed with a scrafling scraf as his feet kicked rock and debris down the new tunnel; he spun about and pressed his back to the wall as he scanned the room below for any reaction to the noise. After a moment of no such reaction, he headed on down the shaft. At the end of which Colin found a twisting corridor that descended even deeper into the Mines. Colin felt like he’d already investigated a bit farther than he was willing, but turning around now would be silly.
Of course, when he did turn around, he was nose to nose with a giant metal spider that just dropped from the ceiling above him. He felt his heart jump into his throat, which was interesting since he was solid light. Even more so, considering even the heart ticking away in that distant stasis pod was a mechanical prosthetic. A heart was simply not a thing Colin Vice possessed. None of these thoughts helped him deal with his current problem- which was the lightning quick heavy metal limb, which first took his feet out from under him, and then pinned him to the ground.
The thick metal limb, would have skewered a normal man. The metal tip was like a claw, digging into the solid light mesh that was his skin. The ‘pain’ was a sharp pressure, more of an awareness, really, though enough to register in his mind that he should react. The pain was a tool, to help create the illusion, not only for an observer, but for Colin to feel human while he inhabited the device.
This was about as bad as the ‘pain’ got, but the pressure threatened to break the solid light structure within, which proved to be a completely different and new sensation. Oddly, it felt like an alert bleeping in his ear. Colin did not know what would happen after that. As the pressure increased, the light began to fracture and well up from the ‘wound’. Like a shining beacon, the white light filled the tunnel, which turned out to be much taller than he’d previously imagined.
The shining light revealed another spider’s arrival, crawling on the ceiling from the shadowy recesses of the new corridor. The drone skittered forward until it hung directly above him as he lay still pinned by the first. The massive metal contraption dropped from above, twisting in the air, its sharp metal limb came down hard… right between Colin’s eyes.
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