Space Odyssey: Spectre-Chapter 206: Scorch Mark

"Uti and Josef, have you reached the second floor?" Jace asked as he moved down the hallway. He was moving through the hallway at a jogging pace. In front of him at the end of the hallway was an elevator and hopefully more than one.

"Affirmative- KKRRZZCH- are on our- KRZCH- minimal resistance for the moment." They responded with some static cutting their communication and then he saw it was not just their channel but all of the communication channels that were suddenly having issues. He could see it on his heads up display. He could no longer receive or send messages through the communication channel.

But it was doubtful they could send out a jamming signal world wide. They would need a massive structure and for that to work or a control of several ships. It was more likely that the Elder’s Church was being used as a jamming device for all of their communication channels. But for them to actively do it just after he used his communicator meant they were listening and possibly watching.

He arrived at the end of the hallway and only peaked out for a second before jumping back as a barrage of red lasers came from both directions. They were not crossing so the turrets at either end of the hall would not hit each other. But they were covering all angles he could easily move to either of them.

So instead of moving toward them he dashed to the elevator side panel pressed a button and then dashed back as the lasers shot through the air. Scorching the elevator doors, wall, and floor. He then waited patiently for the elevator to arrive. Glancing back down the hall toward the entrance where a not enslaved AI connected to a turret was actively firing down at something.

DING!

The elevator made a distinct noise that he was honestly not expecting from a Victorium elevator. Then the doors slowly opened while Jace dashed toward it. But as he was moving it was almost as if everything began to move in slow motion as the turret inside the elevator was revealed.

His second foot on the ground as he dashed toward the elevator he slightly tilted his body as he moved. It resulted in him only getting grazed on the arm as the laser melted through the yellow hexagonal shielding that appeared so quickly and disappeared just as quickly that he almost missed it.

Jace flinched in pain as he felt a burning sensation cover one side of his arm. But then he was indie of the elevator and using the same arm to force the barrel of the turret upward while he used his other arm to disconnect the enslavement device that was attached to the AI. Once it was off the turret stopped trying to actively shoot him.

He then stood up and looked at the panel that was inside of the elevator. It was a touch screen, so Jace took a moment to access it and then go to the second floor. The elevator doors closed and it began rising slowly.

Jace took a look at his arm and saw the armor piece just below the outer edge of his shoulder had a black scorch mark with the impact point having a slight dent. Fortunately it had not chewed through the flexible armor between the plates or even touched it. The armor plate appeared to have dispersed the heat internally and on parts exposed to the air and his skin. Which is why he felt so much heat that made him think he was touching a hot pan.

He glanced at the turret and touched it. Looking at the turret’s schematic. He could feel a hum from the AI core that was attached to it as he looked at the schematic and saved it. The AI sent back a signal like it was grateful.

He sent back a small surge of electricity that would provide it some power in response before removing his hand as he looked over the schematic in his mind. But before he could get anywhere the door made the ’dinging’ noise again and opened.

Jace was welcomed to the sight of Josef slamming his armored covered foot down on an enemy’s head causing it to explode in a bloody mess. While Uti was pummeling another enemy with the but of his gun, the enemy was clearly trying to surrender but Uti was ignoring it in favor of killing the enemy.

After a second they both froze while Jace waved, "Uti and Josef, if you two are done on this floor would you like to board?" Jace asked as waved at the open space in the elevator.

"Yeah, we are just about done here." Uti answered as he spun his gun around and shot the enemy he was bashing in the face. "So what is this thing?" Uti asked as they boarded the elevator and Jace clicked a button to have the elevator go to the highest floor it could, the sixth floor.

He was honestly at this point just winging it. He was given the task of killing the Elders but they had no positive idea on where they were at the moment. So he would have to climb as high as he could and maybe disconnect whatever jamming device they were using.

"That is a turret," Jace answered as he turned his attention back to the schematic as the turret gun waved slightly side to side. "A turret with an AI attached to it. Same type as the one that was at the front door. They use some type of energy source to fire while the barrels actively cool and disperse the heat. I will be honest the gun and ammunition are not something I have ever seen before. But it almost makes me think they attached a reactor to a gun." Jace explained with exasperation because that is honestly what he believed they might have done.

"Well that is terrifying." Josef cut in as he crouched to get a closer look and confirmed that it was not plugged into an external power source. Which meant the weapon had an abundance of its own especially if it could fire lasers hot enough to turn an armored and shielded individual into ash.

"The Elder Council was really holding out on us." Uti nodded in agreement. "There is no way for us to know what else they might have planned." He then looked at Jace. "Speaking of plans... what exactly are we doing?"

Jace shrugged, "honestly? I think we are going to take someone or multiple someone’s alive on the top floor we can reach and then we can interrogate them. We need multiple pieces of information. But the information I want the most is the location of the Elders that are in the building and the location of the AI core that is controlling the building." Jace informed with a shrug, "By the way use your limbs to check corners for more of these weapons," He turned his body so they could see the scorch and dent mark on his armor. "Because if this can do this to my armor with my shield up then it can likely just burn through your armor as a whole."

"Now that is terrifying. Our squad leader, telling us to sacrifice so we do not die if this thing might be around a corner." Uti remarked with a chuckle before looking back at the turret. "What should we do if we find more of these?"

"Get close and detach the enslavement device. AIs hold a grudge about being enslaved but these are using tags to target enemies so it will designate us as friendlies after we free them." Jace told them. "With that being said, do not risk it if it does not look possible for you to get close enough to remove the enslavement device."

They stayed quiet for a few minutes after that as the elevator continued to climb. Then Josef was the one to speak. "Sooo... how are we going to interrogate the enemy when we capture them?" Uti and Jace both looked at him. Josef could see Uti’s expression but Jace’s expression was hidden by the black and orange visor. After an uncomfortable moment, Josef shifted on his feet before continuing. This was a man whose armor was partially covered in enemy blood and he was nervous. "I mean, some of them seemed pretty fanatical."

"I can be pretty terrifying and threats of extreme and repetitive violence usually trump fanatical devotion." Jace answered with another shrug as he pulled the Wildfire off his back checking the magazine as the elevator neared the sixth floor.

Uti made a noise that Jace was going to classify under laughter as its feather and furred exposed skin slightly shook. "I can imagine, I mean that weapon was tearing through the enemy like they were &*%$&%$ on the lower floor."

Jace blinked for a moment at the sudden noise before he realized that Uti said a word that the suit could not create a translation for. "Ha! You just said a word that does not have a human translation or comparison."

Uti and Josef both looked at them and Uti nodded, "remind me later to show you what a &*#%&^ is. I am sure we could come up with a translation or comparison with some effort."