Chapter 18
Rochester, Homeland
After U-1 flamed a police cruiser with a Plasfusion blast, everyone wanted to stay out of the Lucid android's line of sight. So the surveillance over the building was being done exclusively by recon drones that kept moving at irregular patterns and altitudes to avoid anti-air fire.
A block away on a side street, the deposed Chief Mitchell and much of the police force was hunkered down. They saw a pair of all-white UN medium duty trucks approaching their position. There were cheers among the hopeful people who had their TV programming taken over by the Lucids and then blocked by the government.
The special detachment of elite UN soldiers of the 203rd Hunter-Killer Anti-Silicon Personnel Brigade arrived at the edge of the police station. They were in full uniform with city camouflage, which was a pattern of patchy looking grays and blues. They wore the powder blue helmets with the letters “UN” on them, except for Major Enzo Bernard, who had the UN blue beret and also had the EU flag patch on his shoulder. The eight troops were armed with very heavy 4-gage military shotguns, loaded with solid robot slugs instead of conventional shells packed with small round shot.
“Greetings, Major,” Chief Mitchell said with a half smile as he shook Bernard’s hand.
Major Bernard spoke with a slight French accent. Clearly he had learned his English in the UK. “I hear you have an android problem.”
“Yes, unfortunately it has captured Plasfusion weapons, and it has some Sidekick units with it.”
“I couldn’t believe that when I heard it. Anyway, we will mount an assault.”
“Nice shotguns,” the chief said.
The major handed the chief his 4 gage to look at. “The human body is mostly a bunch of water and soft tissue. A regular shotgun will just punch a bunch of little holes in it. Our guns shoot a big slug that will pulverize a robot, or at least a part of it.”
“Don’t you have any robots with you that can go in there and tangle with them?”
“Here’s the problem; I know it is not all that likely, but if we send robots in there and that android has or devises some kind of electromagnetic pulse weapon, they will use it to fry all of your equipment in there. I know you don’t want that, so that is why we organic troops are going in there. They probably won’t use an EMP on us. It would be not very effective.”
The chief said, “I’m not sending anyone in there, as long as that thing is armed with Plasfusion firepower.”
“Chief, that thing is only one android, right?” the Major said, shrugging his shoulders. “We’ll be careful. We have a job to do and we have no other choice, you know.”
Bernard and his men started putting on their headsets and loading ammunition. Then the Major pulled out a boxy looking device with treads, covered in more of the same city camo.
“What’s that?” the chief asked.
“A jamming device. It won’t melt any circuitry. Sometimes it works alright if it can find the right channel. Anyway, it is supposed to help keep the android from communicating. Maybe you could say any robot in the area won’t be able to hear itself think. We’re not all just about shooting, you know. We got technology too. Testing, one two,” he said holding the mouthpiece to his headset. “Sound off.” He stood in place listening for each of his men to respond to confirm communication was online.
The chief asked, “Aren’t you at least going to wait until night to go in there? If we wait, maybe an Inquisitor unit with a blockbuster will show up.”
“Waiting would be a big mistake. We study the enemy before we go in. I know the Lucids have very good night vision. I don’t want to have to augment our own vision.” Bernard loaded the gun with the huge robot slug shells, and then he pumped the slide with the distinctive shotgun loading sound, only louder, to chamber one. He said, “Sometimes, the old kind of weapon is what you need. Besides, I can imagine you have an element of the population here who would misbehave once it becomes dark and then you have no control over anything. I’ve seen it so many times. I don’t want my superiors to ask me why I am waiting. You think you could get some police to go up and help open the front door for us?”
“Major . . . I’m not so sure . . . “
“Chief, I know this kind of thing is really dangerous. I’m surprised I’m still alive, doing this kind of thing so much; so many of these robot gangs. I ask myself, Enzo, why you get into doing this? But you know what? I used to love killing androids. And women like to see a soldier in a uniform. It used to be so much fun, but now, not so much, because I have friends who died, you know. Anyway, when I get done here, I’m gonna write a report. I’m gonna tell Stalin City who was a help and who was not a help. Okay?” He stared directly into Chief Mitchell’s eyes.
Chief Mitchell turned to a police lieutenant and nodded. The lieutenant understood that he was to go off to organize the door bashing team to get the soldiers in the station.
The UN troops and the police scurried up to some parked cars that were across the street from the police station. They all knew that parked cars were not a hard point against Plasfusion bolts and were more of a gasoline filled death trap, but at least they might be out of sight. Then Bernard quickly motioned for a soldier to run across the street to the burned out police car. The point soldier, holding his weapon out in anticipation of a target, ran out and took the position. The Major and more soldiers followed, then the police with the door battering ram.
The police whammed and slammed the door several times with the tool that they were so used to when they couldn’t remotely unlock a door. Finally, the extra-strong mangled door relented and they got it opened. The police held it open for the soldiers who went in single file, alertly holding their weapons pointed in whatever direction they were glancing.
It was difficult to see inside and down the interior hallway that had no outside windows. The floor was wet and their steps were making a splashy noise. The occasional droplet of water made a seemingly loud dripping noise in the quiet as they hit the puddles of water on the floor.
The point soldier held up his fist for all to stop. Everyone froze in place. Whatever the point man had heard, no one else was hearing it. The soldiers were not feeling in control of the situation. They stood frozen for far too long as they listened for footsteps, or the quiet hissing of PAM muscle movement.
Then the lead soldier saw some shadowy movement up ahead and adjusted his aim, but then he could not find a consistent definite target. U-1 tossed Gorky the clown Sidekick with one arm around the corner from another hallway at the soldier. The flying Gorky latched onto the soldier with one hand by the collar, and screamed an attack yell while it was repeatedly hacking at the soldier with its small, yet very real, hatchet. “Get some!” Gorky screamed as it attacked.
The soldier also screamed as Gorky continued the attack. “Help! Get this thing off of me! Get it off!”
A second soldier charged ahead and struck at the clown Sidekick with the butt of his shotgun. Then Gorky fell, and the soldier kicked him. The kicking soldier injured his leg on the metal toy. A couple of shotgun robot slugs from other soldiers missed Gorky and blasted large holes through the wall near the waddling clown toy as it fled.
“Ha! Ha!” Gorky said as it ran away. It ran down the hall and turned in the direction it was thrown from.
An amber glow appeared that helped light the scene. Bernard saw that two of his men were down. One was holding his leg and the other was moaning and covered with blood. “Bah laisse tomber!” Bernard said, naturally resorting to his native French in frustration as he saw that the jamming device was the source of the light because it was burning. He realized he had underestimated this enemy. The only progress made was opening the front door while suffering two casualties. This enemy would not be neutralized by normal ART (Anti-Robot Tactics), like a lower and mid level AI. To effectively use ART tactics, which were more complex than mundane anti-organic tactics, it often took considerable time to identify the weaknesses of the enemy and then find ways to exploit them. The major knew it would be best to regroup and reevaluate the situation than to pay the steep cost of guessing wrong in a close combat situation.