Binary Storm: A Paratwa Novel by Christopher Hinz

Author:Christopher Hinz [Hinz, Christopher]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Angry Robot
Published: 2016-09-19T16:00:00+00:00

Thirty

Had the assault on Thi Maloca not been shrouded in the utmost secrecy, it would have been deemed one of the most important missions in the annals of the Earth Patrol Forces. But it was a mission that Nick suspected would never be fully documented in the formal history texts. Its purpose and details were likely destined to be known only by rumor.

To prevent information about the assault leaking to the Paratwa, only the EPF’s top officers, each one vetted by Nick and Bel, knew the target in advance. The soldiers, numbering in the thousands, weren’t told what they were attacking until their suborbital troop carriers and auxiliary assault craft were moments away from dropping out of the noonday skies into the jungle clearing.

The EPF had lobbied for a simpler plan, one that would spare their troops from harm. They’d wanted to use nukes to destroy Thi Maloca. Fortunately, the mission planners succumbed to Nick’s logic, given due weight thanks to his generous underwriting, that vaporizing the site wasn’t in humanity’s best interests. The potential for capturing servitors or other high-level servants of the Royal Caste and retrieving valuable intel outweighed the nuke option.

It was ten in the morning in Philadelphia. Nick and Bel sat in his apartment, waiting for the attack to begin. Although Thi Maloca and most of the surrounding region were unsec territory and riddled with jamscram, an EPF tech battalion had saturated the area’s upper troposphere with special com nets just prior to zero hour. For the duration, standard communication feeds would function, albeit on a limited basis. But it would be enough for the soldiers to talk to one another and to their mobile command center circling overhead in the stratosphere, and for an orbital spy cam to allow Nick and Bel to observe the assault via a channel routed through Sosoome.

“Wake me when it’s over,” the mech drawled from his place on the top bookcase. Sosoome was in lounge mode, sprawled face down, content to function as a passive conduit.

Nick’s monitor displayed a panoramic aerial view as the assault began. Five massive troop carriers swooped in and touched down. The landing force’s robotic contingent disembarked first: battle androids, autotanks, booby-trap defusers and other specialized units.

Resistance was light: only sporadic thruster and projectile weapons fire from half a dozen low buildings that constituted the above-ground portion of the Ash Ock’s secret base. The fact that anyone was shooting back at all constituted the final proof that the kidnapped researcher’s intel was valid. The complex was not what its map ID and documentation with the Brazilian government signified: a peaceful musicians’ commune dedicated to melodic explorations that incorporated the rhythms of the rainforest.

The battle androids and autotanks swarmed the buildings where the resistance originated, riddling them with machine gun fire and energy blasts. One of the structures must have housed munitions. It exploded into a massive fireball that engulfed the nearest troop carrier.

The aircraft tried to lift off but couldn’t get free of the conflagration. Its

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