Dreadnought
Chapter Five: Dreadnought Strikes
Del Oro University Campus
Three Days Later
The unmarked lorry pulled up outside the university campus. Sitting in the driver's position in the cab dressed in clothes that made him look like any other trucker Joseph Karland smiled grimly. He was looking forward to this - getting his hands on some of N'Tek's nanoprobes would be relatively easy here. Here on the university campus Josh McGrath/Max Steel was vulnerable - more vulnerable than he was anywhere else because here he was confronted by the problem of hiding his powers from the student community on the campus. Here he couldn't respond to an attack from Dreadnought as he could elsewhere. But even if he could respond Karland was confident that he would be no match for a Dreadnought unit.
Opening the door Karland clambered out of the cab, went around to the back of the lorry, opened the rear door and climbed in. Sitting in front of him was the cocoon like transport container for Dreadnought. Besides the container was a small workstation from which he could monitor Dreadnoughts systems. After carefully closing the door behind him he opened the container.
Inside Dreadnought lay silent and inactive. Calmly he picked up Dreadnought's control pad from its storage slot and with an evil grin pressed one of the buttons there.
Sensory perception burst back upon Pete floating silently in the prison within his own mind. Finally, he thought wondering how long Dreadnought had been inactive yet simultaneously dreading what he knew would be coming. Dreadnought being active again meant that Vostok had chosen another target. More people were going to die at his hands and he was so utterly powerless to prevent it. Before this hell had started he had never physically wanted to harm anyone - if you discounted that time a few years ago when he'd wanted to punch Josh on the nose for making a pass at his girlfriend, and the few times nearly two years ago no when he'd again wanted to punch Josh for causing Laura so much pain. Of course he'd later learned that he would have only gotten in one punch before Josh used that nanotech-enhanced strength of his to break him in half.
Pete abruptly became aware that Dreadnought was sitting up and climbing out of the transport cocoon that served as a source of power for all of Dreadnought's systems. A set of mission instructions appeared in the bottom corner of his vision and Pete felt a jolt of mixed horror and hope. Horror as he saw that the orders were to disable and capture Josh so that a sample of nanoprobes could be taken from him, hope that Josh would turn the tables on Dreadnought and destroy him releasing him from this living hell.
Karland was opening the lorry doors letting in the bright sunshine of a Californian morning. From the intensity of the light Pete guessed that it was probably around midmorning. Dreadnought began moving jumping out of the back of the lorry and starting for one of the entrances to the sprawling complex that was the university. Pete clung to the desperate hope that in the coming battle with Josh/Max that Dreadnought would be defeated and that he would be released from this hell and allowed to slip gratefully into death.
Josh McGrath wandered down a corridor in the literacy and humanities block of the university campus without enthusiasm for his next class. It was literature again - Professor Guerard would be going on about the Shakespeare play The Merchant of Venice that they were currently studying - and make it sound really boring. It wasn't that he disliked Shakespeare - it was just that he found the Old English it was written in hard to cope with at times - but at the moment he had other things on his mind. Like Pete still being missing without trace and now Vostok's new living weapon called Dreadnought.
And then there was that strange feeling he'd had about Dreadnought ever since Dad had briefed him and the rest of Team Steel on the mobile intelligent weapons system that used a human as a host in order to achieve mobility. The feeling that the host was someone close to him or someone he had once known. Josh hadn't been able to shake the feeling and it was worrying him to death.
Static abruptly crackled in his ears as Berto activated the audio portion of the bio link.
"Hermano we've got trouble," Berto said immediately. Josh paused and glanced around to make sure no one was in earshot before responding.
"What kind of trouble bro," Josh asked.
"Our sensors have just picked up energy emissions outside the campus but coming in. They match the records of Dreadnoughts energy emissions recorded by Cybernet. The FBI gave us a copy."
"Dreadnoughts here?"
"So it would seem hermano. Dreadnoughts heading straight for the block your in, so I'm certain that your its target."
"Oh great. This place is full of innocents."
"I know. We've located a lorry parked outside the campus it seems Dreadnought came out of it. Kat, Marshak, Rachel and Jake are on their way to apprehend the driver and anyone else inside. Stopping Dreadnought is up to you. You have the EMP device I gave you right?"
"Yeah it's on my belt."
"Good. When you throw it at Dreadnought remember that the blast radius is around four meters. You have to get out of that range before the device detonates or it will knock your nanoprobes off line as well as Dreadnought."
"I do know Berto. I have no desire to get whacked by an EMP pulse. True the effect on my probes doesn't last very long but I feel lousy for hours afterwards." Berto chuckled softly.
"Good luck hermano."
"Thanks bro I'm going to need it. First things first lets get the students out of here."
"How?" Berto asked. Josh's eyes hit on the fire alarm box on the wall. "That'll work," Berto admitted.
Josh moved quickly over to the fire alarm box. With one quick punch he broke the glass and triggered the alarm. Immediately the air was filled with howling shrieking noise. Josh gringed he'd forgotten how loud that bloody alarm was. Quickly he nipped into the nearby storeroom and hit the morphing control on his bio link and felt the familiar warm pulse of energy shooting up his body as he was instantly transformed into Max Steel.
"Stay their hermano," Berto instructed him. "I'll tell you when Dreadnought enters your area." Max nodded as he heard the sound of shouting and running feet as students and lectures poured out of the classrooms and lecture halls in response to the fire alarm.
He waited for quiet some time. After a few moments the sounds of shouting and running feet had faded away as the students and staff evacuated. Now the only sounds he could hear was the wailing of the alarm. Max hoped that Dreadnought showed up soon as it wouldn't take long for campus security to figure out that the alarm was false and to start looking for the guilty culprit.
"Hermano," Berto called. "Dreadnought's just entered your section and is approaching from the right."
"Thanks bro," Max replied. "Time for a little stealth mode." Max hit one of the controls on his bio link and had anyone been watching they would have seen him literally vanish.
Quickly he opened the door, walked out into the corridor, turned to the right and came face to face with Dreadnought. The thing was even uglier in person than it was on the vidscreen. Dreadnought paused in its advance and began to sweep the area with a laser fan. Determined to get the first blow in before the fan detected him Max back-pedalled a bit then leapt into the air and delivered a powerful flying kick straight to Dreadnought's armoured torso, eliciting a sharp crack as some of the armour was cracked and knocking the man-machine thing staggering backwards off balance.
Pete was relieved that Dreadnought encountered no one as it wandered down the corridors of the humanities and literature block looking for Josh. He knew most of the people here and watching himself kill them if they encountered him would be even worse that watching himself kill people he didn't know. Fortunately Karland's timing had been good and he'd sent Dreadnought into the building just as a fire drill sounded.
Abruptly Dreadnought paused in its advance as it detected a momentary thermal emission ahead. Pete watched as a narrow laser fan appeared from the visor unit and began to sweep the area.
Suddenly Dreadnought was staggering backwards as something invisible and powerful slammed into the torso armour. Damage warnings appeared. The force of the impact had cracked the outer layers of armour and damaged some peripheral circuits. Pete could guess what the cause of the damage was. A second later his guess was proved right as the air ahead seemed to shimmer in the shape of a person and Max appeared. Good move Josh, he thought as the shimmering yellow-green aura of turbo mode appeared around his friend's superhuman alter ego.
Pete watched helplessly as Dreadnought righted itself and charged forwards towards Max. Max stood waiting for the charge. As Dreadnought hit him Max allowed himself to be bowled over and used his body as a hinge to send Dreadnought flying through the air to smash into the floor halfway down the corridor. More damage warnings caught Pete's attention as Dreadnought clambered back to its feet. Several systems had been damaged by the shock of hitting the concrete floor so hard.
Determined to help his friend Pete lashed out at the mental barrier confining him. As before he was thrown back, but with less force this time. The damage to Dreadnought's systems having a knock on effect to all other systems. Encouraged Pete struck again and the barrier flickered and for the briefest instant he had access to Dreadnoughts command systems. Only to be immediately thrown back as programs built into the Dreadnought system came on line and shored up the mental barrier.
A sudden action of Max's caught Pete attention. Max had backed up a bit he noticed and had pulled a small device from a clip on his belt. Dreadnought started forwards towards Max just as he threw it and immediately back-pedalled rapidly.
The device Max had thrown smacked into Dreadnoughts torso and immediately detonated into a sphere of crackling energy that completely enveloped the machine-thing that he'd become.
Emergency warnings caught Pete's attention. Heavy EMP impact, systems were failing. Had he been capable of it at the moment Pete would have smiled even as all of Dreadnoughts systems went down and darkness enveloped him completely, not the terrible sensory deprivation of system power down - but the true darkness of unconsciousness. Pete gratefully gave himself up to the darkness and the freedom it brought.
Outside the campus in the transport Joseph Karland's jaw dropped open as he lost the feed from all of Dreadnoughts systems. For a few seconds he was stunned then he quickly began reviewing the last information feed and cursed. Damn them, he thought as he read the information. Max had used somekind of portable EMP device to disable Dreadnought - completely disable. Every single system was off line. He had to have known that Dreadnought was coming, he thought, else why would he have a portable EMP generator on him? And why would he already be in Max mode waiting for Dreadnought if he didn't know. If N'Tek knew that we were coming then they have to know I'm here. Shit I better get out of here.
Leaping to his feet Karland hurried for the rear doors. Throwing them open he abruptly came face to face with the business ends of four laser rifles wielded by four serious looking N'Tek agents.
"Doctor Joseph Karland I presume," the blond haired female said in a cool, professional, British accented voice. "You're under arrest."
With a sigh of resignation Karland raised his hands above his head and jumped down out of the truck. As she watched Karland be placed in a set of stun cuff Rachel used her mobile phone to call Jefferson Smith.
"Mr Smith we've got Karland," she said.
"Excellent. You and Marshak escort Dr Karland to maximum security," Jefferson Smith ordered. "Max has just disabled Dreadnought. Send Kat and Jake into the campus to help move that thing. The local FBI office has contacted the campus priciple and have ordered an evacuation of the complex on a ruse that their might be a bomb. Their sending a team of agents to do just that. Berto's on his way with a truck to pick up Dreadnought."
"I understand."
"Keep me appraised," Jefferson ordered.
"Yes sir." Rachel ended the call, flipped the mobile closed and relayed the orders to her fellow agents. Kat and Jake hurried into the campus while Marshak manhandled a protesting Dr Karland into the car that had brought them here.
