Of Fire and Night - Kevin J. Anderson [78]
When the two scientists proudly delivered the tiny upload pack with their repeater virus, Sergeant Paxton held it between thumb and forefinger. "Doesn't look like much of a secret weapon."
"If this works, all the compies inside the factory will immediately shut down," Yamane explained with a calmness that Swendsen certainly didn't feel.
"Then we can use the same idea for the other EDF battle groups," Swendsen added. "If we get data copies out to them soon enough."
The silver berets were ready to take down the besieged compy factory, and this time they meant business. No more practice. Lugging sonic battering rams, the new penetration team--five times the size of the previous squad--rushed up to the barricaded doors on the quiet side of the sprawling facility, choosing to enter through wings less likely to be occupied by the murderous compies.
Without slowing, the silver berets hit the factory door. Sonic rams made a deafening bang that Swendsen could hear even through his comm-receiver earplugs. The barricade buckled like a crumpled piece of foil and fell away.
"Move it inside before the clankers come running!" Sergeant Paxton yelled. "Move! Move!"
Protected by a phalanx of commandos, Swendsen and Yamane remained confident in their frantically developed virus. They knew the fix would work; they just had grave doubts about surviving long enough to implement it. Every one of the silver berets carried a tiny datapack copy: Redundancy increased the odds that at least one patch virus would reach the main programming station.
Silver berets plunged forward, weapons raised. Each one carried a projection grid that displayed the primary path for their insertion, along with alternate routes. The commandos ran, armor and weapons clattering, boots thundering across the floor. Swendsen and Yamane were already out of breath in their attempt to keep up, but knew they would be killed if they fell behind. The Soldier compies would close in on them soon.
The group rushed through narrow corridors lined with shelves stacked with fabricated components waiting to be assembled. As they had hoped, the wing was empty, and they encountered no resistance.
"Keep together. Hold it tight!" Paxton yelled.
The commandos did not let up, and Swendsen could see that even the weakest of these men and women was far more fit than either he or Yamane. As part of their training, silver berets ran ten kilometers every day. According to a popular mythos, they ate nails, played catch with boulders, and dangled from cliffs for the sheer recreational value.
The squad pushed into the white-walled clean rooms where Klikiss robot programming was impressed upon the control circuits. I guess it was a big mistake to do that, Swendsen thought. Too late now.
The point commandos dropped to their knees and opened fire as two Soldier compies emerged from a cold, vapor-filled vault carrying replacement modules. Not expecting to see human intruders, the compies spun about. The silver berets blasted them into shrapnel.
"Must be getting close," Paxton said.
Swendsen nodded. "The central upload banks are right ahead."
"Then that's where we need to go." Private Elman kicked open the door.
The background noise grew louder with the hammering of assembly arms, the crackle and hiss of welders, the clatter of moving conveyors. A thousand Soldier compies were at work producing more robots. The first two silver berets mowed down the standing compies with dense, depleted-uranium projectiles, knocking the robots backward, but more machines quickly replaced them.
Paxton shouted, "Can't shoot them all. Blast and run--brute force, not finesse. We have to cut a swath through these tin cans."
Swendsen pointed the way. The commandos formed ranks again and charged like an aggressive football team toward its goalpost. They knocked compies away using exploding slugs and electrostatic short-circuiting fields. But several Soldier compies seized hot weapons from the commandos, then grabbed the unarmed men and women and killed them.
Sergeant Paxton growled, "Look ahead and stay on target!