Chapter Fifty-Eight
With a surprisingly smooth hiss, the magnetic doors of the deployment bay slid open. Like the rest of the academy grounds, the weapons testing facility was untouched... not even a single thing out of place. Bhu'kahuh's hubris would be his undoing.
Provided Vekk could make the proper alterations to the A.T.O.M. Bomb in time.
"Wonderful!" The Asuran genius exclaimed with a mixture of excitement and relief, "The supplemental Agroium is undisturbed. If adding this to the unit won't do the trick, nothing will!"
"Bring the weapon in here, quickly!" Coran ordered, pleased that his demand was met promptly, the bulky explosive device wheeled in swiftly and mounted into position on the rail that was designed to guide it on the first leg of the journey.
Vekk nodded in approval, "I can do the modifications I need right on the rail, good work. Coran, check the status of the rail. It didn't look like the beasts destroyed any of it from what I could see, but I need to know if there is enough to reach the second stage's ignition speed."
The A.T.O.M. Bomb was propelled by two stages, the second of which was a much more powerful rocket propelled charge. The weapon still needed to be moored to the guide rails when the second stage fired or the entire unit would lose all stability and crash ineffectually. There would still be a big boom most likely, but no dead god.
Coran did indeed check the status of the rails via the console at the head of the bay. "Response from the sensors report the full length of the rail is intact. We're as good to launch as we will ever be."
Vekk nodded, "Good. Get out of here and let me do my work."
Coran agreed. "We'll be outside posting guard."
Vekk shook his head dismissively, "That's not what I mean. Pull all forces back. The blast radius on this thing will be huge, and I want everyone clear long in advance. The automated defenses should hold long enough for me to finish my work."
The headmaster of Atal Ra didn't agree with that assessment and aired his concerns, "Then what are you doing to do?"
"Don't worry about me." Vekk replied, "I'll be fine. It's your people that you should be worried about. You've already lost enough good men and women. There is no need to lose more."
Devona put a comforting arm on Coran's shoulders. "He's right, you know. Barradin was telling me their push was stalling before we even entered the facility. I can't imagine they'll be able to hold their ground for much longer."
But the prince wasn't quite willing to surrender the point. He had a bad, sinking feeling about this. "What are you going to do Vekk? This entire facility will be swarmed, even if the automated defenses hold."
"Damn it, Coran, there's a fully sealed bunker underneath this floor." Vekk replied angrily.
"That's not going to survive the blast, Vekk. You know that."
"And I'm telling you that doesn't matter!" The Asuran snapped viciously. "You have duties to your people!"
"And to those in Atal Ra."
"Atal Ra is dead, and it's going to be more dead once this weapon goes off." Vekk dismissed. "Go! Now! Or I'll turn the automated defenses on you!"
The debate had reached its conclusion, and there was little doubt that Vekk had an extremely compelling final argument. Nonetheless, Coran's voice reflected great reluctance as he turned to his communications device, and connected to Duke Barradin. "Barradin, once we emerge from the facility, issue a full retreat of all forces under our command. Let the Charr, Norn, and whatever else proceed as they wont."
"As you command, your highness." The Duke's voice confirmed.
Coran finally acquiesced to Devona and Yue tugging on him, and they took the rear of the guild as they made their way to the exit. But the prince's mind was still racing... there was something about the way that Vekk had answered his questions and concerns that did not settle well with him, that nagging sense of something not being quite right.
Finally, as he, Devona, and Yue were literally two strides from the door, it all congealed into one strong suspicion. Going to his communicator once again, he asked, "Vekk?"
The Asuran was audibly annoyed. "What? I have work to do, and not much time to do it in."
Coran's eyes narrowed, his voice laced with accusation, "How are you modifying the A.T.O.M. Bomb? That unit was packed pretty tight... where are you finding the space to fit triple the Agroium charge?"
Even though the headmaster couldn't hear it, he knew Vekk was sighing in resignation. "It's simple, Coran... I've removed the only system non-essential to the primary purpose of the device."
"Vekk..." Coran warned. "What did you remove?"
"The R.D.S."
Coran froze in place. The Remote Detonation System was what Coran was going to use on the surface once the A.T.O.M. Bomb was in position. Without the system in place, someone would have to have a hardwired connection to the unit itself in order to inject the electric charge that would start the anti-matter conversion and subsequent detonation.
"Vekk! Don't you dare!" Coran howled into the communicator, but found that Vekk had terminated the connection, and in fact disabled his communications device entirely. The headmaster was about to turn around when he was cut off by an arm around his chest, and then was hip tossed completely clear of the facility door.
He jumped to his feet swiftly, his throat ready to bark a demand towards this apparent treachery, when he stopped short, and went dumb.
"Yue? What..."
The assassin was just inside the door, her face a mixture of morose and apologetic. "Get going. You don't have much time." She said softly, gesturing with a twitch of her head towards the human army that was already beginning to fall back.
"I will not have you..." Coran protested, before being silenced by Yue's lips. Devona found herself dumbed by the implication of the assassin's actions that the warrior couldn't even stir the tiniest flicker of jealousy, even after Yue had pulled away, and sealed the facility door shut in front of her.
Coran angrily tapped in the clearance code to open the door, and growled in frustration when the console came back with an error. Repeating the code simply repeated the error, and he was about to attempt a third time when through the reinforced window of the door Yue waved a very demolished panel... the other side of the console on the inside of the door. She then mouthed out a single word, "Go", before finally disappearing from view.
In mindless fury, Coran slammed his fists on the unyielding impact resistant metal, echoing his command for Yue to stop this madness and come out of the bay that instant, preferably dragging Vekk along with her... although his exact words honestly weren't quite as articulate. His rage continued until it was quelled by Devona and the realization that the enemy forces were beginning to close in and push the line once more.
Inside the weapons bay, Vekk was frantically (or as frantically as he could considering he was dealing with some of the most unstable materials known to mortals) inserting the additional Agroium into the reaction chamber. After that, he had to seal it up again, and find a way to secure himself to the bomb so that he would be able to activate the charge once at their destination.
The automated defenses were holding, for the moment, but they wouldn't last long, especially since now the forces of Bhu'kahuh were actively seeking to destroy the city. At least they were leaving the rails alone, probably deeming them far down the list of things to destroy.
He could already hear the hordes clawing in anger and fury at the walls of the facility, stealing a glance towards the security display and noting there was one near breach occurring on the south side of the building.
Hence, he was startled when he heard Yue ask, "How long do you need?"
He dumbly regarded the assassin before managing to reply, "Uh... about fifteen minutes?"
A muffled roar of an Oni from the south side drew both their attention, prompting Yue to draw her sai and move towards the sound of the noise. "You've got ten." She muttered grimly before disappearing from the bay with a shadow step.
Fighting back panic (as well as the increasing foreboding of Bhu'kahuh's increasing influence), Vekk dutifully got back to work. This was going to be close...