Operation: Catspaw: A Gamer's Universe Story Read online

  Operation Catspaw

  A Gamer’s Universe Story

  Sam Witt

  Pitchfork Publishing

  Contents

  Untitled

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  Thank you for reading!

  Books by S R Witt

  Untitled

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any person, living or dead, business establishments, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  OPERATION: CATSPAW

  All rights reserved.

  Published by Pitchfork Press

  Copyright © 2017 by Sam Witt

  This e-book is protected under the copyright laws of the United States of America. Any reproduction or other unauthorized use of the material or artwork herein is prohibited without the express written permission of the author.

  This e-book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This e-book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  First Edition: February, 2017

  As always, this book wouldn’t exist without the steadfast support and unflinching feedback from my wife and daughters. Everything good about this book can be laid at their feet; anything that causes disgruntlement belongs at mine.

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  1

  Heck squeezed her assault rifle’s trigger and unleashed a hail of shockingly accurate shells down the hall at her dismayed opposition. A wide grin split her face as her shots found their mark and her point totals registered as energetic splashes across her augmented reality data screen.

  ..::||//UMBRA COMBAT RATING MESSAGE BEGIN

  Target down! +100

  Double kill! +200

  Target stunned! +250

  Security Camera Destroyed! +75

  .::||\ UMBRA COMBAT RATING MESSAGE END

  The Umbra game’s scoring AI soaked up the data and video feeds from Heck’s implants and pored over every scrap of information before validating her hits and tallying them for the viewers at home. There was a delay, to protect the scenario in progress from outside interference, but the network audience was getting every second of astonishing footage just as it happened. The premium subscribers got the full immersion VR experience, and lived the scenario from Heck’s view.

  It was the next best thing to being there, and Heck knew how to play to the crowd. Her subscriber numbers were climbing at a steady pace, which turned all those delicious points into fat stacks of credits for her and her outfit.

  The Indigo Station security team was eager and enthusiastic, but the onboard troopers lacked discipline. Their response to Heck’s team was shocked and confused, at best. The guards returned fire in sporadic bursts, peppering bulkheads, deck, and ceiling of the space station with dents and scorch marks. Meanwhile, Heck and her allies surged toward their objectives unscathed.

  Heck triggered her cybernetic comms unit, “Throd, clear these losers out. I want to get back to Dragora in time for lunch.”

  The augmented veteran stomped out of cover, his cybernetic legs sprouting brace struts that speared into the station’s deck with metallic screeches. He leveled the autocannons mounted on his metal forearms and unleashed a screaming swarm of bullets down the passage.

  Heck took advantage of his withering assault to reload her assault rifle and double check the scenario, just to be sure the networks hadn’t made any changes since her team punched through Indigo Station’s defenses and burst out of the landing bay like a runaway fire.

  ..::||//UMBRA SCENARIO REPORT BEGIN

  UMBRA SCENARIO: ASSET EXTRACTION

  EXPECTED OPPOSITION: Non-Operator security guards

  SPECIAL DEFENSES: Unknown

  OTHER NOTES: Station plans uploaded to Operator AR data panel

  OBJECTIVE 1: Extract Asset (2000 points)

  OBJECTIVE 2: Inflict 5 million units of collateral damage to Indigo Station (500 points + 250 points for each additional increment of 5 million units)

  BONUS 1: No Witnesses (Leave no witnesses who can identify the extraction team) (500 points)

  ODDS OF SUCCESS: Indeterminate. Extent of Opposition Unknown

  .::||\ UMBRA SCENARIO REPORT END

  She didn’t much care for the unknowns in this scenario, but she needed the points for upgrades and to pay the bills. The Metal Rats, the outfit she now commanded, was brand-new, and their ranking was somewhere below the basement. If she hadn’t inherited the charter from her former team after their bloody betrayal, Heck knew they wouldn’t even be able to get crappy scenarios like this one. And if they didn’t put some points on the board, they were going to lose that charter. “Beggars can’t be choosers,” she muttered to herself.

  Throd’s autocannons rattled to a halt, and Heck darted out of cover to unleash a blast of suppressive fire at the guards. The wild spray of bullets kept the opposition’s heads down while Throd reloaded.

  “Moving up,” she subvocalized to her comms unit, and scrambled behind another burst of suppressive fire into the cover of a support arch. The guards had given up protecting the station after Throd turned the hallway into a deadly blizzard of explosive lead. They’d resorted to hugging the bulkheads and praying the metal storm wouldn’t find them and snuff out their lives.

  Too bad for them they were between Heck and her target.

  Heck glanced over her shoulder to confirm Throd was up and running again. She raised two fingers to tell the big man to hold his fire, then motioned for Hive to take up position on the opposite side of the passage.

  The Awakened drone surged forward, metal feet banging off the station’s floor like approaching thunder. He crouched behind a support arch and a bracket of micro missiles sprouted from his left thigh. He raised one clenched fist Heck to let her know he was ready, and she gave the nod to Throd.

  A blistering stream of hot metal flooded the passageway, chewing up the deck and ceiling, and tearing the security sensors loose from their moorings. Shrapnel filled the passage like a blizzard of razor blades, shredding the security guards who’d been stupid enough to try and return fire.

  As sparks and shards of metal rained down around the guards, pinning them behind cover. The thunderous barrage had rattled the fight out of them, leaving them unable to mount an effective defense.

  Heck pointed at Hive, “Shake ‘em loose.”

  The drone swung out of cover and opened its mandibles wide to reveal the hidden vocalizer. “Kneel before your metal doom, softguts. Death comes.”

  Micro missiles shrieked from Hive’s leg and flew down the hall like a swarm of angry hornets. The smart projectiles veered around cover to seek out their targets, and detonated with deadly effect.

  A burst of red mist erupted from the guards as the explosives tore them apart and sent body parts twirling down the passage.

  Throd and Heck peered out from behind cover to make sure Hive wasn’t going to unleash another deadly salvo, then shouldered their weapons and joined him to surve
y the damage. It looked like a maniac had redecorated the space station to look like a slaughterhouse. Sprays of blood adorned the walls like impressionist paintings of roses, and scraps of flesh clung to the ceiling like blooming fungi.

  The big man gagged at the stench of burnt meat lingering in the air. He reloaded his autocannons to distract himself from the carnage. “You were supposed to chase them off, not obliterate them.”

  Hive shrugged. “Everyone complains my rating is too low, but when I try to raise it you just complain more. Make up your minds, wetbrains.”

  Heck put an end to the argument before it could gain steam. Hive was very good at his job, but his personality was as abrasive as a power sander on your eyelids. ”Good job, both of you. After that shocking display of overkill, we’ve almost reached our collateral damage objective. Better yet, the maps tell me our target is just around the—”

  A wave of static electricity crackled through the air, raising the hairs at the back of Heck’s neck. She shivered and checked that her assault rifle was fully loaded. “I don’t even want to know what that is.”

  Hive cocked his head to the side and his antennae twitched and pivoted as if searching for something. “Something is wrong. The station comms are full of static. No, not static. Something is trying to communicate.

  The station’s deck rattled underfoot and an enormous misshapen shadow appeared on the deck at the end of the passage.

  Throd lowered his cannons and wound up their rotating barrels. “Company!”

  Hive stiff armed Heck into cover, saving her from a hail of heavy weapons fire but driving her back into the far wall hard enough to drive the air from her lungs with a surprised “whoof.”

  Before the Awakened drone could pull his arm out of the path of destruction, an explosive shell caught him in the elbow and erupted into a ball of fire. Hive’s forearm and hand vanished; oil and hydraulic fluid sprayed from the truncated stump, and his vocalizer spat an incoherent stream of crackling static. He staggered back, status indicators flashing red across his insectile face. He caught himself against a support column and pulled himself into cover. “It appears our opponents have an Ogre.”

  Throd howled as the battle frenzy boiled through his veins. Heck screamed for him to get into cover, but the big man had already driven his support struts into the deck and couldn’t move.

  He sprayed fire and lead from both cannons down the hall, but Heck knew it was pointless. She winced as the autocannon’s shells ricocheted off the Ogre’s heavy armor without leaving so much as a scorch mark. “Shit,” she cursed, and tried to think of some way to salvage this mess before the monster down the hall pounded them all into greasy paste.

  She hazarded a quick glance around the support arch she was using for cover, and groaned.

  The Ogre was a semi-autonomous weapons platform meant for breaking through bunkers and other defensive emplacements. It’s four legs were each as tall as a man and bristled with oblique armor plates that shed bullets like water from a duck’s back. Those titanic legs supported a massive, armored platform equipped with Thunder rifles powerful enough to level a house and anti-personnel flechette arrays that could turn a man into a walking pincushion in the blink of an eye. This one looked like it’d been modified, which meant there was no telling what kind of other nightmare surprises it had tucked away behind those monolithic armor plates.

  Still lost in his frenzy, Throd didn’t realize his left cannon had run empty. The weapon on his right arm hurled the last of its shells downrange a split second later, leaving Throd defenseless.

  The Ogre, on the other hand, had plenty of ammunition on board.

  Thunder rolled through the station passage, and Throd sailed through the air. His support struts had sheared off, leaving sparking holes in his cybernetic legs.

  He landed next to Heck, eyes rolling in their sockets like greased bearings. He opened his mouth to say something, but a bloody cough was all he could manage.

  The salty red spray stung Heck’s eyes and burned on her cheeks.

  She grabbed Throd’s left arm and dragged him into cover next to her. His chest smoked where the Ogre’s Thunder rifle had blown through him, and a thick, red ooze leaked from the scorched hole in his armor.

  Heck’s eyes burned. “Come on, big guy. Hang in there.”

  Throd’s eyelids fluttered, then closed.

  2

  Hive didn’t need to be told what to do. The Ogre was too massive for the drone’s weapons to damage, but Hive had other tricks to play and the rest of his outfit needed his help. If he left them to their own devices, the bloodbags would be dead in seconds.

  The drone deployed the fire lance from his left shoulder, and leaned into the passageway. The plasma jet had no hope of breaching the Ogre’s armor, but Hive had another target in mind.

  He locked on and fired. A coruscating lance of boiling plasma arced between the drones and splashed across the black sensor cluster on the Ogre’s front. Cameras and radar pits boiled away, their sensitive electronics vaporized by the insatiable heat from the fire lance. The Ogre reared up onto its hind legs, smashing its rifles into the ceiling and gouging chunks from the bulkhead plating.

  Hive burst from cover and hauled Heck onto her feet. He grabbed Throd by one of his auto cannons, and lugged the big man into a side hall. He glanced back at Heck, who stared wide-eyed at the Ogre, mortal terror reflected in her eyes. “Heck! Move! It will switch to its backups in a few seconds.”

  Hive led the way deeper into the space station, dragging the cyborg as he went. The big man’s ugly wound left a trail of red ooze behind them, a vivid marker for anyone following them.

  “Filthy meatsack,” Hive snarled, “always making things hard.”

  Heck punched the access panel next to a security door. She motioned for Hive to move ahead. “In here.”

  The Awakened drone stomped through the door and up a spiral staircase into a wide storage room. Massive metal racks lined the walls, loaded down with enough weapons and ammunition to start a small war. Maybe a not-so-small war. ”Most impressive,” the drone said. “Our mission may be scrubbed, but we will kill many humans today.”

  Heck rolled her eyes. “This scenario is not scrubbed. We need to wrap this up so we can pay for a Dragora’s upgrades and climb the rankings ladder. Plus, I’m not letting any of us die here today. If I have to find replacements for any of you, it’s really going to piss me off.”

  “You are very confident. How do you propose we get from this room, where we are about to be cornered by the Ogre, to our target?” Hive nudged Throd’s body with his foot. “And what do you suggest we do with this worthless carcass?”

  Throd coughed up a mouthful of blood, turned his head to spit onto the deck, and clutched one metal hand to his wounded chest. “Not dead yet.”

  Heck kneeled down next to the fallen veteran. “How long?”

  Throd coughed again, but this time no blood flecked his lips. He propped himself up on one arm and probed his wound with the opposite hand. “A couple of minutes. Ogre hit me with an armor piercing round, so it’s through and through. Nicked my lung, feels like, but didn’t catch me in the heart or spine.”

  Heck breathed a sigh of relief. Throd was more metal than man, but his torso still held the vital organs and other squishy bits he needed to stay up and running. Fortunately, he was also packed with enough nanobots to stitch those grody bits back together from anything that wasn’t instantly fatal. If he didn’t catch a bullet in the brain or heart, Throd could recover from just about anything given time. The nanobots would stitch him back together at a cellular level, leaving him with some nifty scars, but no lasting damage.

  “That’s good to hear. Because you’re going to have to hold down the fort here for a while.” Heck gestured to the weapons surrounding them. “Fortunately, you’re in an ordnance vault, so you’ve got plenty of toys to occupy yourself with and the only way for the Ogre to get in is through that door. It’ll have to cut through the bulkhead to ge
t at you, so maybe you could try and dent it a few times with some of this stuff before it gets to you.”

  Hive examined his severed arm, then looked around the room. “And how do we complete our mission from this sealed room?”

  Heck raised one finger. “Oh ye of little faith. They gave us a map, remember? And that map shows…”

  She clambered up one of the shelves. She shoved aside an ammunition crate near the ceiling to reveal a narrow hatch. “A maintenance access tube. It should take us right to the lab where they’re holding our target.”

  Hive’s status indicators flashed a cautious yellow. “I will not fit in that tube.”

  Heck snorted. “You’re not that fat. Get your ass up here.”

  She pried the hatch loose from the wall with her cybernetic fingers, and set it to the side. The tube was cramped, but they wouldn’t have to go far. It was risky leaving Throd behind, but the veteran knew how to use all of this gear, and it looked like there was enough heavy firepower to give even an Ogre a hard time.

  Heck scrambled into the access tube, and tried not to think about how they were going to get out of here.

  3

  Heck wriggled through the maintenance access panel, careful not to get hung up on the gear attached to her war harness. It would be embarrassing to get killed because she’d snagged an ammo belt. She liked having her footage on the networks’ Play of the Week segment, but only idiots wound up on the Oops reel.

  She was not an idiot.

  Once she’d squeezed through the access panel, Heck was relieved to see the maintenance tube itself was much larger than the panel had led her to believe. She stuck her head and right arm back through the entry and wiggled her fingers at Hive. “Gimme my gun and haul your metal ass up here."

  Hive handed her the weapon, and waited for her to pull it back through the panel before climbing the shelves himself. "I appreciate the sentiment, but as an Awakened drone, I have no need for such crude anatomical bits as an 'ass'."