Tech Scavengers [Humorous, Action-Packed Space Opera]

Negasi could hear that thing scuttling towards Nova's position. He was the only one with a heavy weapon, so he needed to help.

"Get the door!" he shouted over his shoulder to Helen.

Jeridan would just have to wait on that blood pack, or in another few seconds there would be no one left to give it to him.

Negasi got to the corner just as Nova was retreating under a hail of fire. The little metal bastard had no compunctions about firing in the corridor.

He reached around the corner with his rifle and fired a burst, then got back as the thing's return fire almost took his arms off. His wound still screwed up his aim, but there was nothing he could do about it right now.

He retreated with Nova to one side of the doorway while Helen worked on the panel on the other side.

Negasi put in a fresh magazine, aimed his rifle at a point near the floor, and waited for the thing to come around the corner. He was the best gunner in the Orion Arm, and a pretty good gunfighter as well. He could take this thing. The instant it came around the corner, he'd unload on it. No way it had tough enough armor to take several direct hits. All he had to do was fire first, and since the thing would be moving, he'd have the advantage.

That is, until it came around the corner walking on the ceiling.

"Cack!"

Negasi desperately changed his aim, only to get thrown back as its twin guns hit him square in the chest. He smacked his head against the deck and blacked out for a moment. When he got his senses back, he heard more firing.

He fumbled for his weapon, surprised he was still alive. The combination of a tough spacesuit and the Kevlar flexweave shirt beneath it had saved him.

Felt like he had a couple of broken ribs, though. Pain shot through him as he tried to sit up.

He blinked, cleared his head, and saw Nova firing her pistol at the combat mech, hardly being able to aim as she had to take cover from the fusillade coming from the killer spider, which was still advancing.

Negasi let out a burst, but the injuries to his chest and hand screwed up his aim and half his slugs hit the top of the doorway, ricocheting back into the room.

Nova shouted something. He couldn't hear over the sound of his own firing but it sounded like nagging.

His shots did get the attention of the combat mech, though. It turned its guns on Negasi.

Uh-oh.

Negasi rolled out of the way an instant before the deck he had been lying on got chewed up by slugs. He let out a shout as a ricochet caught him in the shoulder.

Suddenly the rounds stopped, replaced with a drumming sound of metal on metal.

He looked up, trying to hold his rifle steady, and found Helen had shut the door.

He groaned and lay back, utterly exhausted.

Nova came and took his rifle. Fair enough. Helen came and started patching him up. Even better.

"How's Jeridan?" he groaned.

"He'll be fine," Helen said in a soothing voice. She put a bandage on his hand. "I need to work on you."

"You didn't have time to give him the blood pack."

"I'll do that right after I get to you."

She reached down the back of his neckline to stick another bandage on his shoulder. Despite being in acute pain, Negasi felt a little shiver at her touch. He hadn't been touched by a woman in too long. Even a half-woman like her.

The bandage stuck, and its chemicals instantly sealed the wound. The nanobots impregnated into the fiber came awake and started to work on healing the tissue damage.

Nova had invested in first-class medical supplies. Smart move considering her lifestyle.

"Jeridan has internal injuries," Negasi said. "He needs an injection."

"So do you."

She pulled out a hypo, snapped a nanobot capsule into it, and injected him through the wrist.

"Lay back and let them do their work," Helen told him, stroking his forehead.

"Give me a stim. This fight isn't over."

Helen hesitated, then did as he asked before heading over to help Jeridan.

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

Negasi could tell she had given him a medium-strength stim. The effect kicked in gradually so as not to overtax his system. First, he felt a flush of relaxation that washed away all pain. After a few seconds, this was replaced with a buoyant feeling. Only physical, not mental. He wasn't high, just fighting fit.

Negasi sat up. His head didn't spin. Good. Then he stood up, wobbled a little, and pulled out his flechette pistol. It hadn't done any good against that killer robot, but holding a weapon, any weapon, made him feel better.

Nova stood with his rifle at the midpoint between both doors, looking from one to the other and back again. Helen had locked both of them, but obviously Nova didn't trust that robot not to find a way in.

Negasi felt the same.

He grabbed another external power supply and some tools from his pack, paused to look at Jeridan, who looked a little more alive after the injection, and moved to the nearest porthole. He moved with care, not making any sudden movements. He still had internal injuries that were healing, even if he couldn't feel them.

He hotwired the panel and used the external power supply to open up the protective shutter.

The Antikythera hung in space not far off. Now that the shutter was open, his commlink could reach the ship.

He checked the commlink on his spacesuit and found it still functional. That was a relief. The suit had several punctures and many of its internal systems had failed. It would be no good in a vacuum, so he'd have to find another way to get back to the ship. One problem at a time.

"Hey folks, we've run into some problems over here."

"What else is new?" came Aurora's chirpy voice.

"No, I mean serious problems. An Imperium-era combat mech just kicked our asses. I'm hurt bad, and Jeridan is hurt worse. We've barricaded ourselves into a room but we're not sure if that will hold it off or not."

"Ohmigod! I'll send over Poopsie."

Poopsie is what the girl had named their own combat mech. She had even painted it pink. Somehow that made the thing look even more intimidating.

Good thing that mechanical spider wasn't pink. If a pink combat mech had killed him, he could have never lived with himself.

"The combat mech looks like a giant spider. Program it not to destroy anything that looks like a computer. If it defeats the first spider, have it search for more."

"Will do!"

"Wait. Is it going to be able to deal with the airlock?"

"Oh. Right. I don't suppose you can get to it?"

"If we could, we'd be over there right now."

The S'ouzz's baritone voice came over the commlink. "My own robot has an extendible arm that can manipulate controls."

"That little metallic dog has an arm?"

"It comes out of its back."

"Oh. Great. Send it over."

Why hadn't the S'ouzz mentioned that before?

"Hang in there," Aurora said. "We'll save you."

Saved by a teenaged girl. Humph. Well, more like saved by an advanced combat mech.

Not yet. Can it defeat what we just faced?

Negasi had no idea.

He turned and looked at his friend, who still lay unmoving on the floor. Some color had come back into his face thanks to the blood pack. The nanobots were busy fixing his internal injuries just like they were fixing Negasi's. In a couple of hours he should be fine.

Assuming they had a couple of hours. Big assumption.

"It's gone," Helen said.

"What?"

Helen had managed to turn on the vidscreens for both doors. The spider mech was nowhere in sight.

"When did it leave?"

"I don't know. I just got these on and it was gone."

"What do we do?" Negasi asked no one in particular.

"Hope and pray that my daughter gets that robot to us in time," Nova said.

"Right. Give me my rifle."

"I should keep it."

"I'm the better shot."

"I'm uninjured."

Negasi couldn't argue with that. While the stims made him feel one hundred percent, that didn't mean that he was.

They stared at the vidscreens for a minute. Nothing.

Negasi gave Jeridan a nervous look.

"He'll be fine," Helen said, putting a hand on his arm.

Negasi squirmed and pulled away, trying not to look like he was. He still wasn't accustomed to dealing with someone with implants. That was illegal on every known system.

And why did she have to be so touchy-feely?

He moved over to Jeridan as an excuse to get away from her.

Something came over his commlink, all crackly.

Negasi got in line of sight of the porthole.

"What was that?"

"We're sending the robots over," Aurora said.

"That was quick."

"I got an A+ in programming through the Universal Correspondence School."

"Nice one. Um … what level of programming?"

"Intermediate."

"Oh."

"I'm fourteen, give me a break! Don't worry, Poopsie is easy to program."

"I sure hope so."

"It's back!" Helen cried.

He ran over to the vidscreen, not a good move when nanobots were still trying to patch together his insides. He didn't have time to worry about that, though.

Negasi got to the vidscreen for the door facing the corridor and saw the spider walking along the floor. On its back was another robot, a small four-legged model with several extendible arms on its side.

Negasi recognized it as common make of Imperium service robot.

He also recognized the modern external power pack that it was plugged into.

"Where the hell did it get that?" Negasi asked.

"Damn it! One of my crew must have forgotten it!" Nova said.

"Well, now we know how the combat mech got enough juice to repower after three hundred years, but who plugged it in?"

Nova didn't have an answer to that.

It was obvious that the combat mech was able to manipulate the power pack. Maybe it had a retractable arm inside its carapace. Many combat mechs did. Negasi hoped the power pack didn't have enough juice left to get the service robot functional.

One of the service robot's arms unplugged the power pack and it hopped off the spider's back.

So much for that hope.

They heard a scuttling of metal on metal as the thing climbed up the door. It had magnetic limbs just like the combat mech.

More scuttling. The vidscreen winked out.

"It's going to override your block and open this door up!"

"What do we do?" Helen asked.

He had no idea. He hurried over to Jeridan and gave him an injection of stims. Then he took the guy's pistol and handed it to Helen.

Helen blinked with surprise. "You trust me with a weapon?"

There was a hint of a smile on her lips.

"In this situation? Yes."

Jeridan groaned and rubbed is face. "Wh-what happening?"

"What's happening is we're about to get slaughtered."

"Then you shouldn't have woken me up."

"Get off your lazy ass and think of a way to help."

Jeridan groaned and got on his hands and knees. Negasi turned back to the doorway, feeling defenseless with only a flechette pistol in his hand. Nova stood at his side with the rifle. Helen busied herself rewiring the panel, trying to keep the service robot from opening the door.

Negasi knew the best they could hope was to delay it. The service robot knew far more about Imperium electronics than Helen did. It knew more than anyone in the modern universe.

The clattering on the other side of the wall continued.

And then the door opened.