MAG.E 2/MAG.E 2.adf/36/36

Text File | 1977-12-31 | 19KB | 341 lines

@5Frontier Cops
-------------
@1
  "Take it and run, I can hold them off for a while!" Jack yelled
as he threw the case to his companion.
  "No way!" came the reply from Rob Lingham, "We're both getting
out of this alive or neither of us do!"
  "But the orb!" protested Jack, "It must get back to the
Federation!"
  "Sod the Federation."
  The two Frontier Cops, Jack Gillespie and Rob Lingham, had been
assigned to try to re-capture the golden orb - civilizations
mystical power source - from the Wilrans. The Wilrans were the
Fedration's bitterest enemies. Small, scaley, ugly humanoids from
a distant planet, Wilran, they had stolen the small but powerful
orb as it was being transferred to a new energy conversion complex
on Zeta Alfrinscon.
  The orb's strange ability to provide unlimited electrical energy
if used in the right conditions was a marvel uncopied by any known
scientific means. It had been found on the long-dead planet of an
ancient race of scientific humanoids, who had accomplished
magnificent heights of technological achievement. Scientists of
the Federation were still hard at work trying to unravel some of
the many other secrets discovered on this world, but had long
since given up the work on the orb.
  After weeks of trying to track down the orb, they had found the
Wilrans secret base on a giant asteroid out in the depths of
space. Many such bases existed in the galaxy, but many were so
well hidden that the Federation had not been able to wipe them
out. The Wilrans were by now a serious threat to the power of the
Federation. They had succeeded in destroying many of the
Federation's most valuable outposts, and had built up a formidable
armada of ships which rivalled even the best of mankind's.
  After finding their way in through a disused airlock, Rob and
Jack had managed to stay hidden until this moment. Desperate to
get the orb back, they had confronted a group of armed Wilrans as
they were taking the orb to the central generator, where it would
have been connected up and thus it's tremendous and seemingly
inexhaustible energy would have been harnessed.
  Now they had the orb, but they were fighting a losing battle as
the Wilrans advanced towards them as they frantically fired round
after round of blaster fire at them.
  "Back there! Look!" yelled Rob above the sound of raw energy
crackling against the beams around them. "It's some kind of air
conditioning grid. Get it open, I'll hold them back."
  Without wasting words Jack waited for his opportunity then
dashed across the corridor and took a deep breath when he was once
more behind the cover of a beam. He examined the metal mesh cover,
trying to work out the best way to open it. Screws! Shit! He
didn't have a screwdriver.
  "To hell with it!" he said, and fired a full strength energy
bolt at it. That was the best way to open it, he thought with
satisfaction. He looked into the gaping hole and saw that the grid
had indeed covered the entrance to a air duct. Plenty large enough
for a man to crawl through, too.
  "Come on! Get in!" he shouted to his friend. Still blasting
away, Rob lunged across the passage and through the hole. With a
few last shots at the still advancing Wilrans, Jack followed him.
  "Shit! It's dusty in here!" mumbled Jack, as, stifling a sneeze,
he followed in the dust trail left by Rob.
  "Any idea as to where the hell we're going? I mean, this may
take us straight to their jail for all we know."
  "Sorry, mate. I asked one of the beady little buggers if I could
borrow the plans, but he wouldn't let me!" answered Jack not a
little sarcastically.
  "Little bastards! Just can't rely on 'em, can y'!" replied Rob
seriously. "Hang on, looks like another grid ahead. Slow down,
will yer!" Jack had bumped into him.
  "Sorry. Where is it?"
  "Looks like a jail."
  "Are you pulling my leg?" whispered Jack, uncertainly.
  "Sure am. I think this is the control room, but it looks pretty
empty from here. Three, maybe four of the little buggers. Easy."
  "Not the best angle of attack though, is it!"
  "Don't panic. When I say 'Now', get ready to move." He aimed his
blaster at the grid a few feet in front of him. With a surge of
pure energy the grid disintegrated in a cloud of smoke. "Now!"
  He leaped forward through the hole and out into the control
room. He'd already identified the blast-door control and his first
task was to lock the heavy doors shut to keep out any Wilrans who
happened to hear the fighting. Then he dropped to the floor behind
a computer terminal and seconds later Jack joined him.
  The Wilrans, who had at first been too stunned to act, were now
grouped at the opposite end of the room, and had opened fire on
the invaders. Rob grabbed a grenade from his belt and ripped out
the pin - he preferred these to the new type grenades. Their
weight gave him a better sense of power.
  "You mad fool!" gasped Jack. "You can't throw that in here, it's
much too powerful. It'll blow the lot of us up!"
  "What kind of a gormless wally do you take me for?" asked Rob,
then saw that his friend was about to speak again. "No, Don't
answer that, it's a rhetorical question. This grenade only has a
small amount of charge in it. One of my close range stock. With
any luck it'll blow up the willy's and leave us O.K." as he spoke
he threw the grenade up and over the terminal in front of them.
  When the smoke cleared, Rob got up to inspect the damage. With
slightly more caution Jack joined him by the mass of wrecked
equipment and bodies that marked quiet clearly where the grenade
had struck.
  "Hmm bit more charge than I thought," admitted Rob.
  "Man!" exclaimed Jack. "You're hopeless. We nearly get blown up
by one of our own grenades and you say 'bit more charge than I
thought'!"
  "Keep your hair on! It worked didn't it, what more do you want?"
  "Never mind! What now? A few reinforcements would be handy - if
you haven't blown up the radio."
  "Do you think I'd do a fool thing like that? I spotted that it
was way out of the blast zone before we started. It's over there,
take a look and see if you can work the thing."
  "Are you joking? What am I, a dummy? I've got training, and
don't you forget it!"
  Rob let that one slip.
  These two were constantly bickering, but they were still the
best of friends. Friendly competition is what an onlooker might
have called it. But that wasn't really what it was. They didn't
compete at all. Both knew the other's capabilities, and both
relied absolutely in the other's judgement, but bickered simply to
relieve the stress of the situation. Let's face it, the idea
worked! These two were the top cops on the force - bar none!
  The control room was quite large and the force of the blast had
only destroyed one corner. All the important instrumentation was
controled from her, but most probably had overrides that could be
activated from outside. The thick blast doors were almost
indestructible but the walls, floor and ceiling were much less
tough, and it was through these that the Wilrans would attempt to
regain control of the room.
  Both men, under their tough exterior, were extremely worried as
to how they could possibly escape this miniature world. Unless
they could summon assistance their plight looked grim indeed.
Their space ship was landed not far from the base, but that was no
help if they couldn't leave even this room!
  Already Rob could see pictures of Wilrans scurrying around
outside the blast door on the closed circuit television. He
realized that they could also see him, and shut it off. The one
good part of this situation was that that blast door could keep
the Wilrans out indefinitely.
  Realizing that the ventilator was a method of ingress that the
Wilrans would be quite able to utilise - better than they had, in
fact, due to their small stature - Rob took a few armfuls of the
scattered junk created by his grenade and pushed them into the
gaping hole in the wall, them turned his blaster down low and
melted the whole thing into a solid 'plug'.
  Quickly scanning the room for other such ventilators - there
were none - he seated himself at a still-functional computer
terminal and hacked into the main computer. From there he could
call up various maps of the complex. He knew his computer time was
limited. Even though the control room was supposedly proof against
any kind of attack, it was unlikely that the Wilrans hadn't got
some ways to at least shut down the links to the main computer.
  Before that happened, however, he had managed to extract the
information he wanted. There were three service tunnels which ran
a few feet below the control room. Each gave access, sooner or
later, to the surface of the asteroid. One, even, led to within
yards of where they had left their ship.
  "Any luck on the radio?" he called to Jack.
  "Yes and no. I got through O.K. and Cop Central have re-routed
the nearest ship to come and assist us. The bad news is that it
can't possibly get here for two and a half days minimum. That, as
I told them, just ain't soon enough. Looks like it'll arrive here
in time to clean up the mess."
  "Maybe, maybe not. Here's the plan." He spread the map out on a
clear table top. "We bore down through the floor here," he placed
his finger on the spot, then brought out the map of the next
level, "and come out into this tunnel. The records say it's not
been used for years, so with any luck we'll avoid the Wilrans.
Either way, we then make our way down this way to this cross
tunnel here. Then we follow that tunnel to the end, and out
through the airlock. It should then be a simple matter to find the
ship and leave."
  "You make it sound so easy," grinned Jack. "But why not use that
tunnel there? The one that leads to almost where our ship is
landed?"
  "For all we know, the Wilrans may have already found our ship
and therefore be guarding that airlock. We didn't have time to
hide it all that well, remember. Going the way I've suggested will
allow us to approach from the rear, so catching any guards off
their guard, so to speak."
  "Fair enough. Well, I agree with all that. What's the floor made
of? Can we use our blasters on it?"
  "I doubt it, but there's some cutting equipment over in the
emergency locker. I checked that a minute ago."
  "Good. Let's get to it then."
  It took some time to cut a large hole which extended nearly all
the way to the roof of the tunnel below. When it was completed,
they broke their way through the last bit and dropped down to the
floor of the tunnel. Unfortunately for them the corridor was not
empty. The Wilrans were no dummies and had placed guards in all
the possible exits to stop the Cops from escaping.
  However, the two men had the advantage of surprise and before
any of the startled Wilrans could bring even a single gun to bear
they had been blasted out of existence. The noise, however, echoed
loudly down the corridor and it was obvious that nearby wilrans
would have been alerted.
  "Damn!" muttered Jack. Then an idea came to him. "Say, Rob,
these floor panels are removable. What say we make the trip under
the floor and walk right out under their noses?"
  "Definitely worth a try. Grab that end." Together they lifted
one of the panels out of position to reveal the space below.
  "It's big enough. Lets hope the dratted Wilrans don't think of
the same thing and come down looking for us! Not the best place
for an encounter!" They climbed down into the gap and pulled the
panel back over their heads. "Eugh! It's disgusting down here!"
  "Well, it was your idea! Stop complaining. Anyway, would you
rather let the Willy's get you?"
  That stopped the conversation.
  Doing their best to move silently, they crawled down the tunnel
to the intersection. From there they made it without trouble to
the airlock.
  Once there, they emerged from the space beneath the floor,
looking very filthy. The special suits which they wore were of a
new type which had hoods which could be pulled right over the head
and sealed. The small oxygen cylinders in the pockets completed
the outfit and allowed the wearer to move in airlessness for
around half an hour before the oxygen ran out. These revolutionary
new suits had transformed the way the Frontier Cops worked. Now
they could work, like they were doing, without the worry of having
to get space suits. If Jack and Rob hadn't been wearing them, they
would certainly have been stuck!

  In fact, it turned out that the Wilrans hadn't yet discovered
the Cops' hidden ship. Therefore it was just seconds until they
were seated inside the small but complex cockpit and rapidly
running through the pre-flight checks.
  "Everything buckled down? Shocks on? Ignitors ready? Computer
on-line? Fuel connected? Suppressors Activated?" asked Rob, the
pilot, as he systematically ran through the list.
  "Yup, yup, and a triple yup," replied Jack, as he flicked
switches in time with the words.
  "Hang on then!"
  The massive underjets spewed forth their terrible energies and
the ship slowly began to lift itself from the tiny world. Even
though the asteroid was not very large in planetary terms (though
as an asteroid it was huge), the dense metal of which it was made
gave it a gravitational force not much lower than that of Earth
itself.
  As they lifted off and could hence see over the curve of the
land, a formidable sight met their eyes. A huge camouflaged cover
was rolling slowly aside to reveal a great subterranean cave
filled with the Wilrans fighting ships. The sight was greeted with
dismayed gasps from the two Cops.
  "The little buggers must have had detectors out and as soon as
they detected our ship they were alerted," said Jack, despair in
his voice. "Can we outrun them?"
  "Depends how good their ships are. This is one of our fastest,
but that means nothing. The Wilrans have got all sorts of things
we haven't."
  "Damn!" came Jack's short reply. Then he clambered out of his
seat - possible now that the fast little ship had reached maximum
speed and stopped accelerating. He made his way towards the rear
of the ship where the main gun controls were situated.
  Strapping himself in, he reached up to the control helmet and
pulled it over his head. Then he reached up again and flicked the
switches that would charge up the gun. After a few seconds a
cross-hair firing target lit up on the helmet's view-screen
goggles and the gun was ready to go.
  After firing a few test rounds to make sure everything was
working fine, he grabbed the controls and spun the seat round to
face the oncoming Wilrans. Up on the top of the ship, the huge gun
mimicked the movements he made.
  Three Wilran ships were already in the air - in the vacuum
really, but the old terminology was still used despite it's
inaccuracy. More ships were being launched as he watched through
the high quality picture being transmitted to the gun helmet from
the camera on the gun above. As well as the main gun, the ship was
equipped with smaller guns in various positions around the ship,
and the operator could select which gun he wanted to use at any
one moment. As well as this, the pilot - should he have the
opportunity - also had a smaller gun turret above the cockpit
which could be activated at any time. The Frontier Cops didn't
lack firepower in their ships!
  "Here they come, Rob, get ready to do some fancy maneuvering old
Son."
  "You just look after your end, I'll look after mine," retorted
Rob.
  Jack was too busy to answer, now, with some half-dozen small
Wilran fighters coming up surprisingly fast behind them. The
larger vessels still seemed some distance away. Obviously the
Wilrans had only managed to make the speed of their smaller craft
faster than those of the Federation.
  Jack aimed at the nearest enemy ship and depressed the firing
button. Up above him the main gun swiveled round to imitate it's
masters movements, and delivered it's lethal stream of energy
straight to the target. The ship blew up and for the brief second
whilst the ship's meager supply of oxygen was being used up it
flared into bright flame. Then, as quickly as they had started,
the flames were extinguished by the cold vacuum of space.
  "That's one!" cried Jack exuberantly.
  "Yeah, right," remarked Rob dryly, "just keep it up for another
day or so, will ya."
  It was true. They had to hold out against the Wilrans for more
than a day. Even though they had better fire power and defense
screens than the Wilrans, they were far outnumbered. They had to
hope that they would just give up sooner or later. Preferably
sooner!
  Jack sighed. Lining his sights up on another enemy ship he
continued the unending fight.
  "Damn! We've been hit up the rear, and badly!" yelled Jack
through the open connecting door.
  "That ain't the half of it! The bolt hit us so hard that it's
increased our velocity and we're leaving them way behind! What
amasing luck for us."
  "I never thought I'd be glad to get a shot like that! What about
the damage, though? Can we actually stop when we rendezvous with
the other ship?"
  "Yup. Front jets are still O.K."

  Just under one day later they were met by the Frontier Police
ship 'Exuberant', and were taken on board with the prize they'd
taken back from the Wilrans.
  "Well, there it is!" said Jack proudly, "the great golden orb.
Looks good eh?"
  "Um.. yes. Look, fellows, I know you two have been through a lot
but I've got something to tell you. I think you'd better both sit
down."
  "Nuts. Just tell us."
  "You aren't gonna like this." The Captain took a deep breath.
"Well, you see, it's like this. That golden orb that you've got
there," he pointed to the shining treasure, 'is not. That is to
say, it isn't the golden orb. It's a fake."
  Shock came over the faces of the two cops. They both sat down.
  "But... Whaa.... Er... Shucks! You mean to say that those bloody
Willy's have still got the original?" Rob's voice rose notably in
pitch from it's normal steady level.
  Jack just sat there looking stunned.
  "Oh no!" answered the Captain hurriedly, "the original orb is
safe. You see," he tried to explain, "the real orb was safe all
the time. The President had arranged for it to be transported in
secret, while the fake one was taken in the ship. Unfortunately,"
he was apologetic in the extreme, "there was a cockup and we
weren't informed. Thus we thought the real orb had been stolen,
and naturally we tried to get it back. We only received word to
the contrary a few days ago, and we couldn't reach you." He looked
at the two dazed men in front of him. "Sorry!" he said simply.
  Rob and Jack left the office quieter than usual.

                         THE END

by Michael Barnes - 19-7-89