The CRES code

Chapter Seventy One - The State of the War

     The spaceship was far larger than Randall had imagined. The size of a medieval castle and as high as its tallest turret. It was mostly a single silvery cylinder sitting on six stumpy legs, it's underside sporting a number of rocket nozzles that were still smoking as they cooled in the winter air.

     A hatch the size of a tennis court had opened half way up in the side and machines resembling bulldozers and excavators were being lowered to the ground by a crane. The machines had wire frame wheels evidently designed for driving around on the dry, dusty surface of the moon, and those that had been driving around in the turnip field were already gummed up with mud, effectively immobilising them. One had had its wheels removed by smaller robots that scuttled around like crabs and scorpions on spindly, metal legs. As the humans watched in fascination, a machine looking like a small tip up truck carried a thick, solid metal wheel to the bulldozer and the crabs bolted it in place on the axle. A short distance to the side stood three machines that had already had their wheels replaced and were waiting for the order to drive off to war.

     "They couldn't have had those wheels just lying around, just in case they would ever have to land on Earth," mused Jane to herself. "They had no idea they would ever need to land on Earth until a few hours ago. They must have a fabricator somewhere in that ship. I wonder how long it'll take them to start printing off proper war machines?"

     "They'd need to have the files for war machines," replied Emily. "The files we created, back before the nuclear war, may still be archived away somewhere. The question then is who has access to them. War machine files for a fabricator may be what decides the outcome of this war."

     She was right, Randall realised, and that was worrying. VIX almost certainly had war machine files. They had the kinetic bombardment satellites, after all, one of the most powerful weapons ever devised by man. The spaceship sitting in the turnip field in front of them, though, was industrial in nature, not military. It might well only have access to files for industrial equipment. If that were so, then they would be able to print a bulldozer but not a tank, and that would mean that the war would be over very quickly. If Randall was going to use his infected machines to his advantage, therefore, he would have to do it quickly. Very quickly.

     "You know what to do," said Loach, looking across at him. "Right?"

     Randall nodded dismally. He did indeed.

     Loach studied his face for a moment, looking to see if his facial expression showed the correct amount of resignation and acceptance of his fate. Randall tried to comply, while struggling to keep his face from betraying the one hope he had left. Fortunately his face was swelling up nicely from the beating it had taken from the two henchmen and that made it easy for the businessman to keep his determination secret. He would not let this, this criminal steal his destiny. He would not! He would die first. If Loach saw any trace of that in his eyes, though, then he would die now and that would be that.

     Once again, his lifetime's experience at lying came to his rescue and Loach nodded in satisfaction. "Watch him," he said to Brick. "If he makes one wrong move, you know what to do."

     "Sure, Boss." Randall felt the knife prick his skin above the kidney again.

     "Then let's go meet the neighbours." Loach stepped forward, out from the cover of the trees, and the others followed.

     The machines spotted then almost immediately. One of the bulldozers fitted with the solid steel wheels moved to bar their way as they made their way across the field and a long, thin device mounted on its upper side turned to point towards them. Randall thought it looked like a spectroscopic sampling laser that analysed rock samples by vaporising some of it. If so, it would probably make short work of a human being.